


Lost in Translation

by jiminthestreets_bonesinthesheets



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Grinding, Hurt, M/M, Minor Character Death, Pining, Porn, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Possible smut, Slow Burn, Smut, Stranded, implied masterbation, little bit of self destruction, mckirk - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-17
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2019-10-30 11:23:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 45,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17827634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jiminthestreets_bonesinthesheets/pseuds/jiminthestreets_bonesinthesheets
Summary: “Attention citizens. This is the crew of the Enterprise asking for your aid. On Stardate 2264.78 a shuttle manned by our captain and fourteen cadets was ambushed by an unknown source and chased out of sight of our ship and into open space. Those cadets as well as our captain, James Tiberius Kirk, are still missing. We are asking anyone with any information on their whereabouts, or regarding the attack, to please contact the Enterprise immediately. Our family would appreciate any assistance you can give.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this is a work in progress but it’s basically finished and I’ve been making great headway with this recently, so this will be the first fic I’ve ever finished! Woohoo!! And I'm thinking that I’ll probably stick to a Sunday post schedule.
> 
> Also a little note for y’all to keep in mind while reading. I have tagged this fic “possible eventual smut” and that’s because right now I don’t have any planned buuuuut… I'm going to leave that option up to you guys! Between the readers here and AO3, if you're still with me by the end of this fic, leave a comment and let me know if you would be interested in an epilogue or end scene with smut. I’ll post a reminder at the end, but keep it in mind while reading.
> 
> And if anyone is interested in being tagged for future posts for this fic or any others I may post, please let me know and I’ll add you to the list! Thanks for reading <3

Chapter 1:

“Jim, no!” 

Two words Jim had become most accustomed to hearing in their now almost four years in space. Also, the two words Jim had gotten very good at weaselling his way around. 

As their fellow crew mates piled into the loading bay around them, Jim laid a gentle hand on his best friends shoulder, giving it a light squeeze before saying, “Bones, I don’t know what you're so worried about. We’re going from the ship to the planet’s surface, nothing is going to happen.”

“I already hate these flying metal death traps as it is, Jim, I don’t need the added headache of you on one of them alone.” Bones was near tomato red at the distress he felt in this argument, but Jim insisted it had to be this way. Didn’t mean bones had to like it.

“I won’t be alone, Bones,” he smiled at his friend, “I’ll have fourteen other cadets on board with me.”

Bones scoffed, turning away from Jim for a second before rounding on him again, “You mean fourteen fresh out of the academy cadets, who have no idea what they are doing, let alone what protocol is if something should happen! And I don’t see any of them in medical blues, so what good’ll that do ya?!”

“Bones!” Jim exclaimed, chuckling a little, “I don’t know what you're so worried about? What could possibly happen in the short distance from here to there?”

“Anything, Jim!” he threw his arms up, slapping them hard against his thighs, “Anything could happen in this god forsaken black nightmare! And if I'm not there to help you, who will?!”

Jim couldn’t help but laugh, “Bones, why did you ever apply for Starfleet?”

The doctor shook his head, he knew why, but it was the “who” that mattered in that equation. The “who” that kept him in line, that kept him focused, and who forced him to remain in the academy rather them turning tail and running for the hills like he had wanted to after his first flight simulation training. It was Jim, he was the reason why Leonard had made it this far. “Kid, I think you know exactly why I dragged my sorry ass all the way up here. Had a lot to do with an over adventurous and dangerously impulsive, sandy blond.”

“Awe, Bones, you're making me blush.”

He ignored Jim's comment as he continued, “Not to mention cocky, clumsy, accident prone-”

“Alright, alright, I get it,” he shook the doctors shoulder lightly, bringing his eyes back to look at his own, “even though nothing is going to happen, I promise to be careful. Now, you just get on the smaller ship with Spock, Ny, Sulu, and Chekov, and I’ll take the new cadets and meet you down there, okay?”

Bones furrowed his brows, still not happy with the outcome, but Jim was giving him no other option. “I don’t like this, Jim. I should be with you on that shuttle, just in case.” Jim only huffed a small sigh in response, “And why do you always have to be Mr. Fantastic? Let someone else take the kids alone, or at least let me come with you.”

Jim turned his best friend, then pulled him into his side with an arm around his shoulder, “Because it would be nice to have some words of wisdom and guidance coming from their captain. Going on your first ground mission is scary, Bones, I want to make sure that they know they can trust me and come to me for help if they are scared. And I can’t bring you along anyways. There’s a rumour going around amongst the younger cadets about a certain grumpy doctor with an arm full of hypos ready to attack. They’re afraid of you, Bones, having you there staring them down wont help their nerves.”

“My hypos are only for you.” Jim smiled at that. “But I guess you have a point.”

Jim walked Bones to the door of the smaller shuttle, waiting outside for Bones to step in before he turned back to look him in the eyes once again, “Don’t worry, Bones, we’ll be right beside you, it’ll be fine.”

“It better be,” he grumbled in typical Bones fashion, before clasping Jim on the shoulder, allowing his hand to linger for just a moment, then letting go as the door to the shuttle closed between them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When the door to Bones’s shuttle were fully closed and sealed, Jim turned and made way for the larger shuttle to his left. The shuttle that held fourteen fresh and nervous cadets, probably not ready for their first ever ground mission.

Jim entered the shuttle, it was dead quiet, and every single cadet sat wide eyed and slightly pale in their seats. He knew it would be like this. Though the original crew of the enterprise was not given the luxury of a small and harmless field test, and were instead thrown into the crisis on Vulcan head first, he still expected nothing more then this. 

“Cadet Velnium,” he announced as he made his way to the front of the shuttle.

“Aye, Captain!” A sharp looking young man stood quickly from his seat in a stiff salute to Jim, who smiled and shook him off.

“Take us down to the surface, Cadet, follow behind Commander Spock's shuttle to our right.”

“Aye, Captain!” the dark haired young man bounced past Jim and towards the helm, powering up the shuttle and waiting for the others to lead the way before following them out. 

As the shuttle cruised out of the belly of the Enterprise, Jim stood before the rest of the cadets, they needed something to get them through and ease their minds.

“Cadets,” he began, all eyes instantly whipped up to meet his, “this is your first away mission, and I know you're all very nervous, but I have chosen one of the easiest missions the Enterprise has ever been sent on. So there is no need to be nervous. This planet has been previously visited by other federation ships in the past. If you’ve all read your mission statements, which I hope you have, you will have noted that the planets surface is non-hostile, with breathable oxygen, and no noted threats in the other ships logs. We are landing on the surface for approximately one hour to retrieve a handful of flora requested by the academy’s research department. Once we have acquired what we need, we will be returning to the Enterprise, mission completed. Any questions?”

The shuttle remained silent, all eyes still fixed on him at the front of the group. 

He let go his most charming smile, making sure to give the cadets a second to take a breath and soak it all in before continuing, “Now, I know I'm your captain, but I don’t want that to intimidate you. Should you come into any trouble or have any questions at any time, I want you to feel comfortable enough to come to me with your concerns or suggestions. Here on the Enterprise we work as a team, as a family, and you are now a part of that. So, before we land, I would like you all to-”

Before he could finish the shuttle was violently jerked to the left and Jim was sent flying into the opposite wall. Alarms started going off all around them, the shuttle suddenly being covered in a glow of red, and the screams of the cadets filling his ears. 

Jim instantly sprang into action, launching himself off the ground and planting himself in the seat beside his young pilot. He strapped himself in and commed the Enterprise, connecting Spock's shuttle to the call, “Kirk to Enterprise, we’re under attack, repeat, we are under attack and require immediate assistance. Do you copy?!”

Scotty’s voice rang clear through the shuttle, “Aye, Captain! We see ya!”

Spock's voice was the next to hit Jim's ears, before it was abruptly cut off by Bones screaming into the comm, “Jim, what the hell is going on?! Are you alright?!”

“I'm fine, Bones… for now.”

Jim's shuttle was hit again, this time hard enough to jostle them off path and away from the planets surface, “Shit!” he muttered as they took a third hit.

“Jim!” Bones was still screaming into the comm, Spock clearly having given up, “You're way off course, we’re coming around for you!”

“No!” Jim shouted this time, “You're close enough to the surface now and their ships are backing off your shuttle. Land on the surface and keep the crew safe, that’s an order.”

Jim rarely pulled the captain card with Bones, he hated to do it, but he knew if he didn’t Bones would make sure that shuttle was turned around and the entire crew would be in danger. It was bad enough that Jim's shuttle was taking fire, he didn’t need two shuttles caught in the middle.

“Jim-”

“Bones, listen to me, please,” the channel went silent, the cadets behind him went silent, but he didn’t care and continued pleading his case to his CMO, to his best friend, “Please keep the crew safe. Get them to the surface and when the Enterprise tells you its safe then head back to the ship. After that, when it’s all clear and you’re safe on the Enterprise, then you can come get me, Bones, but not until you’re safe.”

Jim felt like he was only talking to Bones now, not the rest of the crew, but Bones. Of course he cared about every single member of his crew, but he needed Bones to be safe, he needed him to be alive and well inside the walls of the ship. If he didn’t have at least that peace of mind, he wouldn’t make it through whatever he was about to face. 

“Jim, I…”

“Spock!” If anyone would listen, it would be him.

“Aye, Captain,” came the oddly comforting monotone of the Vulcan, “I will assure that the Doctor is returned to the ship safely, you have my word, Jim.”

“Thank-you, Spock,” Jim’s shuttle was hit for a fourth time, sending them even further away from their ship, and with no where else to turn, they had no choice but to keep travelling in that exact direction, “Bones…”

“I'm here, Jim!” The two of them sounded almost hysterical now, but Jim knew he had to hold it together as best he could for the cadets behind him.

“Bones-” 

“Jim!”

That was the last Jim heard from Bones or the Enterprise as their last hit knocked out all their comms. The only thing they could do was continue tying to outrun their attackers and hopefully find a safe planet to land on between here and there. The Enterprise was too far gone to help them now, and Jim had already made it clear that the shuttle containing the bridge crew and Bones was to be brought back on board before anything else was attempted. 

Jim took a subtle, but calming breath, and plastered on a brave face for the young pilot beside him as he continued to try and get comms back up, “Cadet Velnium.”

“Aye, C-Captain,” came the shaky response.

“We’re going to try to out run them, or at least stay in front of them until I can find us a safe planet to land on. You can do this, you were top of your class in flight training, so if anyone can get us to safety it’s you. Just stay calm and focus on your task.”

The cadet gave Jim a brief nod, the shake in his hands becoming less visible as Jim's words of encouragement sunk in. Jim returned the nod and continued to work on the ships comms. Hopefully he could get something back up and running or else, if worse came to worse, the Enterprise would never find them, and Bones… he would never know what happened to him, and Jim wasn’t sure he could live with that guilt, even in death.


	2. Chapter 2

Forty-five days. Forty-five days and still nothing. No sign of the shuttle, or Jim, or the bastards that attacked them, nothing. 

Leonard sat at his desk with his head in his hands, staring blankly at the map of planets before him. The Enterprise had been hovering over a planet for the last four days now. Spock and a small landing party were down on the surface searching for any sign of Jim and his fourteen cadets, and Leonard hadn’t gotten word from them yet. All he could do at this point was hope, and he was worried that even though he was tying to hold on to what little he had left, he would soon abandon it all. 

With the red marker in his hand he circled the planet they were currently searching. As he did, his eyes glazed over the rest of the map covered in angry red X’s. Twenty-nine planets between here and where they were first attacked, where he lost Jim in the chaos, twenty-nine planets and they still had not found Jim. He ran shaking hands through his hair, replaying the scene over and over in his mind. The attack, Jim’s shuttle being bounced around as it tried to flee, then watching helplessly as it faded into the black. If he didn’t find him soon he was sure he was going to go crazy. 

He heard the woosh of the sickbay doors opening from where he sat in his office. He heard the commotion, the nurses running to the biobed being rushed in. Probably another superficial engineering injury, he thought, someone else can handle it. 

“Doctor McCoy!” The desperate cry of his name had his head snapping up from his desk. Mere seconds later a dishevelled looking Vulcan stood panting in his doorway. Leonard hoped, oh god he hoped that this was it, that they had found Jim, but reality was still present in his mind. Jim had been missing on a foreign planet for forty-five days... he was afraid to hope too much. “Doctor, we found him!”

Before he could register his movements, Leonard was launching himself over his desk and running past Spock, the Vulcan right on his heels as he crossed the sickbay at a full sprint. He ran straight for the biobed being pushed in by Chapel and a few other nurses, his eyes instantly searching the screens for vitals. Once he found Jim's heart rate on the monitor, proving to Leonard that he was alive and finally on the ship, his eyes and hands instantly rushed to Jim's face. He was cold, dirty, pale, and covered in bruises and cuts. Some new but many old, he noted. His face was sunk in and he had lost a lot of weight while he was missing, and Len did not like that one bit. He hated seeing his friend, his best friend, in such a horrible state. The usually healthy Jim Kirk always came with a few cuts and bruises, but this… this was a lot for Leonard to take in. But the worst, he thought, were Jim's eyes. Circled in darkness and shut tight, even as he called out his name, were red rimmed and wet. Len knew that could only mean one thing. As Jim lay alone in god knows what state, probably thinking the worst and accepting fate, he had been crying, thinking he would be dying alone on a foreign planet. The thought alone made Leonard's stomach flip, almost enough to make him throw up, but Jim needed him now, he could be sick over it later when Jim was at least stable.

With his hands still holding Jim's face, his fingers sliding down to press against his neck feeling his pulse weak under them, he called to him, “Jim, Jim can you hear me?!” but he got no response, not even the slightest movement. “Jim!” he tried again but he was met with still silence.

As they continued moving Jim through the sickbay, Chapel recited Jim's condition in a steady voice to Leonard. Not only to inform the doctor of his patients condition, but also an attempt to bring Len back to reality and out of the Jim Kirk daze he was currently in. Jim would get through this, but he would need Leonard at his best. “Doctor,” she began “the captain is malnourished, severely dehydrated, and he has several injuries both internal and external that will need immediate surgery… Doctor?”

Without pulling his attention from Jim he responded, “I’ll do the surgeries.”

Though he hadn’t looked away from Jim, Chapel could tell that he was less “Bones” now then he was before, and more “Doctor McCoy”, hopefully realizing that Jim would both need and want the latter. “Good,” she nodded, “he wouldn’t want anyone else to do it.”

He didn’t respond to that as they made it to the operating room, taking one last look at Jim before letting him go and turning to his team, “I need someone to set up an IV, he needs fluids immediately, and we need to start dissolving nutrition and protein packs into the line now!”

At his barked words, two nurses left the room at a run, returning seconds later with the supplies he had asked for. They had the IV set and running in less time then it took to blink, and Len turned to leave the room to prepare himself. As he reached the door Chapel took his arm, holding him there to whisper between them, “Leonard,” in all his years with her, she had never once called him by his first name while on duty, “it doesn’t look like he’ll be waking up any time soon, I…”

He spared a glance back at Jim behind him, still unconscious, still unmoving, before turning back to her with a sigh, “Let’s gets his injuries fixed and his health on a steady incline, we’ll worry about… about the coma later.”

She nodded, letting him go and following him out to prep herself to aid him with Jim's surgery. Neither saying another word to the other. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

Bones emerged from the operating room ten hours later with a sigh of relief. Jim was stable. The surgery went well, though this didn’t mean Jim was completely in the clear. He still had a long way to go in regards to healing, but the worst of it was the coma. Bones couldn’t tell when Jim would wake up or.... if he would wake up, and that scared the absolute hell out of him. 

As he took off his dirty scrubs and threw them in the bio bin, his eyes never left Chapel as she moved Jim to a private room at the back of the sickbay. As soon as he washed up and put on clean scrubs in his office, he made way straight for Jim’s room. 

When he entered, Chapel was still setting things up and taking vitals, and Len stood at the base of Jim’s bed and watched. He watched the drip of the IV fluid, he listened to the hiss of the oxygen machine, he watched the steady flow of the heart rate monitor and thanked god that Jim was still here. But that wouldn’t help him any, hell it wouldn’t help anyone. This coma, this god damned coma, it was keeping Len from the one thing he wanted more than anything in the entire galaxy. Blue, blue eyes, staring up at him in their ever continuous wonder, wide and beautiful as they gazed back at him. And although Len would admit he was a goddamn good doctor, he couldn’t pull Jim out of a coma, especially if Jim didn’t want to come out. He just had to hope with everything he had that Jim hadn’t already given up when he lay dying on that planet alone. 

A clearing of a throat pulled Len out of his thoughts, and he looked up to meet eyes with Chapel. Eyes filled with pity not so much for Jim, but for Leonard. “Doctor,” she nodded as he looked up, “I’ll leave you alone.”

He didn’t respond, just returned his gaze to Jim as she left the room, closing the door with a soft click behind her. 

Once she was gone he moved himself to the side of the bed, sitting in the chair there. His hand hovered over Jim’s for a moment, and he thought maybe if he just held Jim’s hand, touched him, he’d wake up and this nightmare would finally be over. 

A knock came at the door and he pulled his hand away. A muffled, “Doctor?” was heard from the other side and Len recognized the monotone Vulcan instantly. 

The door opened slowly and Spock poked his head in. Finding Len, he opened it fully and walked in, padd in hand. 

“Doctor.” Len still could not bring himself to speak and Spock expected as much. “While you were performing surgery on the Captain I went through the communicator we found on his person when we rescued him. I reviewed all of his entries...” He fiddled with the padd in his hand, stepping forwards and thrusting the padd towards Leonard, “I merged the ships logs with Jim’s in chronological order for the board to review but… I think you should listen to them, Doctor. There are some things in Jim’s logs I think you should hear.”

Len looked at the padd in front of him and shook his head, “Spock, I can’t.”

“You must, Leonard, for Jim.” He pushed the padd towards him again and waited until he reached out a tentative hand and took it. 

When the padd was in Leonard’s hands, Spock retreated towards the door. “Doctor, I know this will be difficult for you, but know that when you reach the end of the logs it will all become clear. Jim wanted you to do this.”

Before Leonard could say or do anymore, Spock had left the room and closed the door behind him, leaving Len alone with Jim and the padd. 

He let it rest heavy on his lap for a while before he finally spoke out loud, “Computer, shade windows.” The large windows at the front of Jim’s room darkened so he could no longer see the nurse’s station, could no longer see Chapel occasionally looking in at him. 

With one final calming breath, he opened the padd and brought up the file Spock had left on the screen for him. There was a long list of logs, so he clicked on the one at the top and settled into his chair to listen as Jim’s voice filled his ears. 

“Captain’s log, Stardate 2264.81. It’s been three days since our attack outside of Harmonia VI by an unknown party. Our shuttle, manned by myself and fourteen cadets in training, crash landed on an unknown non-federation planet on Stardate 2264.78. I managed to escape the crash with minor injuries, but some of my crew were not so fortunate. Our pilot, Cadet Trever Velnium, perished upon impact, Cadets VooHok and Amanda Hollis succumbed to their injuries on our second day, followed by Cadet Kent Vel-Nick this morning. The rest of us are trying to hold on, though most are in bad shape.

As for our supplies, we have rationed our small emergency kit of food as best we can. But between those of us who survived the crash, the eleven of us remaining, I'm afraid we won’t have much left to last past four days. And our medical supplies are dwindling fast, I... I don’t know how much longer I can keep my injured crew members stable, some of the injuries are far too extensive for my knowledge and lack of supplies... I’m afraid a quick rescue from the Enterprise and Doctor McCoy will be their only hope...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Getting into some of the good stuff now, and things really start to heat up in the next chapter! 
> 
> And I know I currently have posts set for weekends but if i can continue making good progress and keep with my goal of actually finishing this fic, ill make updates twice a week, so hopefully you guys will have that to look forward to soon! 
> 
> As always, let me know what you think, I love reading your comments, and thanks for reading <3


	3. Chapter 3

Food was getting scarce, there was no life for miles that Jim could see on this god forsaken hell hole, and he was getting worried that the makeshift shelter of broken shuttle parts wouldn’t hold his crew for much longer. Especially from the looming, and slowly moving storm that was heading right for them. They were open, exposed, and Colten needed severe antibiotics for the infection in the gash on his upper left leg. But damn if they weren’t down to their last generic antibiotic pill in the, very small, emergency medkit. The basic pills that were only meant to hold you off for a few days until rescue, were gone, not to mention not near strong enough for the infection that had festered there. He could tell Colten was in significant pain and suffering every second, and without a quick rescue from the Enterprise it was only going to get worse. Colten would not be able to fight this infection alone if they ran out of antibiotics before they were found. 

Jim let out a hard shaky breath. Four members of the small crew on his shuttle had perished in the crash. One instantly, and three more over the last three days, all from their injuries. But there was nothing Jim could have done for them. There was nothing he could do for any of them really, just like there was nothing he could do for Colten now. He wasn’t a doctor, he wasn’t Bones!

Bones, he thought back to his best friend fighting to get on the shuttle with him, trying to come with him instead of the regular landing party, and thank god Jim hadn’t let him on board. He didn’t even want to think about how that could have ended. Though he would give anything in the entire galaxy to have Bones here with him, helping his injured cadets and comforting Jim, he would rather be alone and know that Bones was safe on the ship and not dead or severely injured like the rest of his small crew.

Colten stirred in his sleep, rolling onto his back with a cry of pain, waking up. Jim turned his attention away from the storm, and away from thoughts of Bones, and crawled over to Colten at the back of their shelter. 

In the crash Jim had somehow managed, by the luck of what he didn’t quite know, to get out with only minor injuries. Mostly some artificial cuts and bruises, a possible sprained knee and a slight limp as a result, but nothing that would kill him unlike the rest of his crew. 

When Jim made it the short distance to Colten, who was now crying from the pain of his leg and surely the burn of infection, he pulled the young boys head into his lap and began carding comforting fingers through his hair. “Hey, Colten, you in pain buddy?” 

Colten couldn’t even find his voice, just gave Jim a curt nod before closing his eyes and trying not to focus on the pain. The poor kid, and that’s just it, they were all kids. Most of them fresh recruits from the academy, straight out of graduation, and now they were either dead or dying. Jim had let them down on their first mission, he had failed all of them. 

Jim continued to sooth Colten as best he could, while reaching into his pocket with his other hand, pulling out two small bottles and shaking them with a frown. 

“It hurts, Captain,” Colten all but moaned, and Jim felt for the kid. 

“I know,” he whispered as he opened the bottles in his hand and dumped the last two pills out, “I’m gunna give you these, Colten. It’s the last antibiotic I have and the last pain killer.”

Colten nodded his head in Jim’s lap, and Jim used one hand to put the pills in his mouth, and the other returned to Colten’s hair. “Unfortunately that’s all we’ve got left. After that the only thing we can do is hope that the Enterprise finds us fast.”

Jim felt when the pain killer kicked in and Colten drifted back to sleep, probably the last good sleep he’d get until they were found... if they were found. 

“Captain!” 

Jim turned his head back towards two young girls lying on the ground beside each other, to the right of Colten. One had been badly tossed around in the crash, she had been in and out of consciousness for days, and Jim was sure she had at the very least, punctured a lung as well as had some internal bleeding. The other girl had similar injuries but was doing better at pulling through the pain and staying awake, but Jim was sure that wasn’t going to last much longer. 

After placing Colten’s head back on the ground he made his way as fast as he could to the girls. 

When he got to them and looked between them, he noticed they were still holding hands. “What’s wrong?” He sat between them. 

The girl on his right, Cadet Mina Kelly, shifted her eyes to his as best she could, watery, sorrow filled eyes, and Jim was sure he already knew. “She... she’s cold. She stopped squeezing back... Captain...” she choked out. 

He tried to hold his composure as best he could as he pulled himself closer to the girl on his left. He laid two fingers on her neck and waited, feeling for himself just how cold she already was. When he pulled back, he looked to Cadet Kelly before reaching into his pocket for his comm. Without a word to the cadet he spoke as calmly as he could into the device, “Captain’s log, Stardate 2264.81. Another cadet lost to the crash, Cadet Olvira Moure... Rest in Peace.”

He closed the comm as the choked sobs of Cadet Kelly came heavily from his side. 

*****************

Two days later found Captain Jim Kirk with two more dead and only seven crew members left from his fourteen man crew. 

Colten had finally succumbed to his injuries. The generic antibiotic not even coming close to doing the job that was needed, resulting in the infection spreading, and a no doubt painful death for the very young cadet. 

The second was Mina Kelly, though Jim would admit he didn’t expect her to last much past Cadet Moure’s death. The two had similarly severe injuries, not only that but as much as the two had tried to be professional, and they had, Jim already knew the two were lovers. They had met back in their academy days, the two hitting it off right away. It was by chance they had ended up on the same ship, but unfortunately fate had a sick sense of humour about that. After Olvira’s passing two days before, he had watched as Mina’s strength to hold on gave way fast, and she soon followed her lover into the black. He knew the only reason she was keeping it together as good as she was, was all for Olvira, and once she was gone Mina had no reason to hold on any longer. 

And if the last five days weren’t bad enough, the storm was almost right over top of them. Jim could smell the rain, could hear the thunder rolling, getting louder and louder every day. He knew this storm was coming and it looked like something he had only seen in movies. It was going to be one hell of a storm and Jim couldn’t do anything to prepare his remaining crew. The planet around them was barren, there was nothing that Jim could use to upgrade the shelter, nothing he could use to make things more comfortable for his already suffering crew. The only thing he could do was sit and wait, and hope to any power that may be that the Enterprise would find them fast.

As he sat outside the shelter, watching the looming fate before him grow closer, he reached a hand to his comm and flipped it open. “Captain’s log, Stardate 2264.83. With a total of seven dead and seven remaining crew members, I fear the worst is yet to come. The conditions of the cadets are worsening, we have maybe one day left of food between us, and no medical supplies of any kind left. Not to mention the ever growing threat of this ominous storm that is almost right on top of us. When this storm does hit, and I know it’s going to hit hard, I expect I will lose more of my crew if we are not rescued by then. Unfortunately there is nothing more I can do for any of them except keep hopes high that the Enterprise will soon find us. But with every day that passes, with no word or sign of our friends or our ship, I don’t know how much longer I myself can keep that up. That is, if I will soon have any crew left to do that for…” Jim ran a hand through his hair, before letting go a sigh and continuing into the comm at a whisper, “god, Bones, I wish you were here…”

*************

Leonard ran a hand across his already clammy forehead. That was only Jim’s first few days of logs and Leonard wasn’t sure he would make it through another forty. 

Leonard had tried to prepare himself for the worst when Jim was missing. He knew there was a large possibility of death amongst the cadets, as well as Jim, but it was a hard reality for him to process. He was missing for over a month, nearly forty-five days Jim was gone from his life, and Len had no way of knowing if he was alive or dead or god forbid, floating out in space somewhere. And that haunting threat had resulted in an almost sleepless forty-five days and a close call with alcohol poisoning.

And now, six days in Jim had already lost more then half of his group. Six days in and at this point the Enterprise wasn’t even anywhere close to finding Jim. But knowing that Jim had to sit and watch, already seven cadets die without anything he could have done for them... Leonard knew that Jim was hurting inside because of it. He would hold all of this on his own shoulders and it wouldn’t be easy for him to get over if he woke up. 

Leonard reached a hand over to Jim, making the decision this time to take his hand in his and hold it tight. Even though he knew it would be the case, it still sent a pang through his heart when Jim didn’t squeeze back. 

He left their hands entwined as the padd prompted him forwards, offering Jim’s next log on the screen and with increasingly shaking fingers, he opened it.

“Captains log, Stardate 2264.85. The storm has finally caught up to us. The shelter is leaking and I’ve already used every scrap piece of anything I could find to patch things up the best I could, but it has so far proven ineffective. We are seven men down and unfortunately… probably still counting. The storm brought with it incredible winds and a drop in temperature, and I'm afraid that on top of the injuries my crew are still suffering, pneumonia could be next. I can’t… I don’t know what to do. The planet we’ve landed on is dry and open, leaving nothing but hard ground around us, now replaced by mud thanks to the rain. There is nothing I can use, no flora to stop the leaks in our shelter, or prevent the wind from breaching the walls, and… and I'm not a doctor damn it! We’ve already lost seven people, four of which I know Doctor McCoy could have easily saved, and the seven remaining cadets won’t make it much longer without proper medical! God-” a heavy breath is heard through the padd, shaky and frustrated, before Jim's voice whispers desperately into the comm, “god, Bones, I miss you so much…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Getting into more of the plot! Always love to hear your wonderful positive thoughts <3


	4. Chapter 4

The storm was raging, and had been now for almost two full days and nights. Now on day three of the torrential down pour Jim was at his wits end. Still with an injured knee, he limped around their crappy shelter as best he could while attempting to patch it up. There were holes everywhere it seemed, and he had run out of shuttle scraps to use for repairs. Water was coming into the shelter from every angle, the ground beneath them was soaked, his already suffering cadets were shivering and with injuries so bad he couldn’t risk moving them, and he was sure his worst fear was coming true.

After last night’s winds and brutal drop in temperature, two of his young cadets had woken late that day with deep, chesty coughs. Pneumonia. And what could he do about it? Nothing, absolutely nothing, not a god damn thing and he hated himself for it. He had tried to get his cadets off the ground as best he could, tried to keep them warm and dry, but one man could not fight the endless amounts of rain this storm was throwing at them. And it seemed, from what Jim could see, there was no end in sight.

After one last failed attempt at fixing more holes, Jim ducked into the shelter to check on his crew. They were holding on, they had been for ten days so far, but who knew how much longer that would last. The two cadets who had definitely come down with pneumonia were still coughing, struggling to breathe in the driest corner of the shelter. And of the other five, three were in and out of consciousness, and the last two were more then likely going to be fighting infections as bad as Colten’s was. 

With nothing more he could do, he pulled himself to lean against the back wall of the shelter. He leaned his head back against the cold metal, the sound of the rain hammering on the metal scraps of their shelter drowning out his worries for the time being. He allowed sleep to take him in hopes that tomorrow would bring the familiar faces of his bridge crew, and the handsome doctor he found himself craving more and more each day. As his eyes slowly closed he thought about strong hands on his face, arms wrapping tightly around him and pulling him close, firm fingers running through his hair as a melodic chant of “Jim, Jim I’m here, it’s ok,” drawled in a sweet southern accent pushed him closer to sleep. And just before his eyes closed completely, a whispered, “Bones…” left his lips and he was finally asleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Captains log, Stardate 2264.89. Last night was probably the best sleep I have had since the crash. I had hoped that perhaps today would bring better fortunes for me and my remaining crew, but unfortunately it was exactly the opposite. Some time in the night we lost two more members. Cadet Owen McDouglas had not only injuries from the crash, but possible pneumonia as well. And Cadet Obnerick Niich, I know he had some pretty bad injuries, but the actual cause of his death I am afraid I will never know. He was one of the members I thought might make it through to rescue. His injuries were not as severe as most others, yet he was gone before I woke up this morning…”

Jim was sitting at the edge of the shelter, looking out into the haze of rain still pouring from the sky above. He was cold, fed up, angry, and soaking wet. All he wanted was to get to the ship, to beam aboard and head straight for his best friend, to Bones, to home. But he had no way of getting there, no way of getting any sort of signal to them, or communication. Getting home was looking more and more like it was never going to happen.

“I hope that the admirals…” he stopped, shaking his head. At this point who cared what the admirals thought, he certainly didn’t. If they ever found the wreckage and his comm, Jim wasn’t making these logs for them, he was making them for Bones. Yeah, the admirals would want to know what happened to him and each individual crew member that passed in their time on the planet, but that didn’t mean they actually gave a rats ass about any of them, but Bones would. Bones would not only want to know what had happened, but would care about what happened to him. And if anyone knew that grump of a doctor it was Jim, and he knew that Bones would not give up until something was found. And if the only thing he found was this comm, then Jim was going to make sure that Bones knew he was thinking of him too. “You know what, I don’t give a damn what the admirals think. Bones… I’m sorry for this, for all of it. But I want you to know that I’m not sorry that you weren’t on this shuttle with me, things are bad down here, really bad. Most of my fourteen are either dead or… or dying, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if that was you, Bones.”

Jim reached up with his free hand to wipe away a stray tear before continuing, “But I’m not giving up yet. I’ve still got five cadets counting on me, and I know you won’t let me go so easily. If I can count on anyone in this galaxy, it’s you, Bones. I know you’ll find me…”

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Captains log, Stardate 2264.9-” Jim paused, he felt like he couldn’t breathe let alone finish his sentence. Fourteen days in, fourteen days shipwrecked on this so far deserted planet, fourteen days of hell he wished he never had to experience. All he wanted was the ship, the crew, Bones… he wanted Bones more then he could express, and fourteen days in he was starting to seriously worry that he would never see him again.

With as calming of a breath as he could manage, he wiped the wetness from his eyes and tried to continue, “Bones… I lost them, I lost them all. I failed every single one of these cadets, our family, I failed our family, Bones!” His voice gave way as the sobs began to take over his entire body. “Cadet M’haka, Cadet Nyara Blanir, Cadet Liam Tyler, Cadet Blake Shaw, and Cadet Dierdra Graff… the last of my crew gone. Some perished from their wreck injuries, others from pneumonia, and a few from I don’t even know what, but I know you could have saved them, Bones.”

He looked out across the endless empty in front of him, the storm still raging on with no end in sight as he spoke again, “It’s been… fourteen days now since the crash, the storm is still going on, I’m cold, wet, hungry, home sick… alone. I have yet to see any sign of life, no species of any kind, and now with all of my fourteen crew members gone… I’m completely alone, Bones.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

For the next three days Jim slept. There was really nothing more he could do. He had no more cadets relying on him for aid, the rain was still hammering down on the shelter, seeping through the cracks and running like a river underneath him. He was soaked through to his core and if something didn’t give soon, he was going to be this storms next victim. But four days later he woke to warmth on his skin, a small ray of sunshine came sneaking through one of the cracks in the shelter landing on his face.

He stretched into it, let his cold skin absorb the welcome heat. Slowly he crawled out of the shelter and into the sun that was already high in the sky above him. Once outside he laid on his back, arms out wide and revelled in the humid air breathing it in deep. Finally, finally his shivering would stop, his clothes would be dry for the first time in days, and his skin could return to its normal non-wrinkled texture. The ground beneath him was already dry and back to its desert like state, but he couldn’t be happier to finally see the sand covered ground surrounding him.

After what felt like hours of just laying in the sun, Jim sat up and faced the shelter. A pang of guilt and sorrow hit his chest hard, hindering his breathing as he thought about the fourteen bodies inside. He had to face it, there was no getting home for them. There would be no bodies to burry if he was ever found, no closure for their families, no peace for his cadets, hell, no one may ever even know what happened to any of them but what was he supposed to do about it? What could he do? With every fibre of his being he wished with everything he had that he could give them the peace and closure that they all deserved and it killed him that now he wouldn’t be able to do that, or at the very least inform their families of their bravery in the face of death. 

Bones would know what to do, he thought as he sat up wrapping his arms tightly around his knees, Bones always knows what to do. But Bones wasn’t there, and Jim had to do something. Not only did he have his cadets to think about, but he was also now completely out of food and almost out of water. If he didn’t come up with some kind of plan he would be joining the cadets soon enough. All protocol stated to stay where you were, to never leave the original site if you were lost or wrecked, but he was starting to think that he wouldn’t have much choice soon.

He looked around himself, seeing desert in every direction. Not a single tree or bush anywhere in between, not even a blade of grass, aside from a small mountain to his right. It was a fair distance away, and he could potentially spend a few days crossing the desert to get to it, especially on a wrecked knee. But there was the potential of finding a water source up there as well as hope that there could be something more on the other side. Maybe people, something he could eat, someone who could help. Normally he wouldn’t take the risk, but at this point he didn’t see any other option.

He reached into his pocket and took out his comm. “Captains… captains log, Stardate 2264.96. Bones, I know it’s against protocol but I’ve decided I have to move on. The storm finally stopped this morning and I can’t stay here and wait to die. I… I’m out of food, I barely have any water tablets left, and that mountain to the right seems to be the best option. I’m hoping that at the very least I can find water and maybe some better shelter, and maybe there’s more to this planet on the other side of the mountain. If I could find some kind of food that would be great, then at least I could survive a bit longer, and if I could find people, hopefully people advanced enough to help, that would be a miracle. So far the only thing that’s on this side of the mountain is desert. But… leaving the cadets here, it feels wrong, Bones, though I can’t exactly take them with me. I’ve already let them down and now I don’t know what to do.”

Jim moved the comm away from his mouth, staring again into the shelter at his cadets. A soft wind had started to blow through, cooling the already sweltering heat. When the wind hit the shelter his eyes darted to a piece of metal that began bouncing around, causing a loud bang to linger across the desert. The piece of metal was hanging on by a thread, it must have been dislodged some time during the storm and Jim hadn’t noticed until now. He watched it flap back and forth, continuing to crash into the metal pieces underneath it, and finally Jim had an idea.

He forced himself up on weak legs, already shaking from lack of food, and slowly limped his way over to the broken piece of the shelter.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Leonard placed the padd on the table beside Jim’s bed, more like slammed it down. What little resolve he had left was gone, he couldn’t hold back the tears any longer and let them take over. Eighteen days and Jim was now alone, the Enterprise at this point was no where even close to finding him, and it was starting to sound like Jim was giving up on the ship and even himself.

Jim had grieved for the cadets he lost, kids, and so did Leonard. Fourteen young and promising lives gone, but Leonard also grieved for Jim. He knew that if anything had happened to any of those kids while they were missing, Jim would blame himself. Even if there was absolutely nothing he or anyone else in his situation could have done, Jim would blame himself entirely, and now he was blaming himself for the deaths of fourteen cadets. He could hear it in his voice, they way he spoke about their loss, about letting them down, failing them. He knew that even though Jim was here, in this room with him, body warm under his touch, that a small part of him died on that planet along with those kids, and now Leonard grieved for it. If Jim woke up this would be a hard bump to get over.

The door creaked open then, and without looking up he knew who it was. “Spock.”

“Doctor.” He came inside and closed the door behind him. He could see that Leonard was crying, that he was holding Jim’s hand and running his thumb melodically across his fingers, and that he had abandoned the padd behind him on the table. “Have you finished the logs, Doctor?”

Leonard shook his head, gripping Jim’s hand tighter in his, “I can’t Spock,” he whispered, not looking at the Vulcan, “I can’t finish them.”

“You must,” Spock spoke not with an air of authority, but an almost plea, which Leonard had never heard in the Vulcan’s voice before. “I know this is difficult for you, I listened to the Captain’s logs as well. But I assure you, all will come together in the end, Doctor. If anything, you must finish them for Jim.”

Without so much as another word Spock silently slipped from the room. Leonard heard the soft click of the door and Spock’s steady footsteps leaving the sickbay, then reached back to grab the padd. He let it sit in his lap for a while before he tapped the screen and brought up the next log. Turned out, the next ship log that fell in line with Jim’s logs, was one of his.

He looked at the stardate on the log, the same stardate as Jim’s last log. Eighteen days of no Jim, of searching the stars and endless planets for him and the cadets, and coming up empty handed every time. Leonard remembered the feeling of hope that would rise in him every time Spock would take a landing party to the surface of a new planet, the anxiety he would feel for the hours or sometimes days they would spend searching the surface, and the gut wrenching heartbreak he would feel when Spock would walk into the sickbay and shake his head. Every time Leonard would find himself in the bathroom, huddled over the toilet and emptying what little was in his stomach. And it only got worse.

With each passing day, and each Jim-less planet they searched, Leonard worried more and more that Jim was already lost. That they would never find him, or possibly find him dead. He didn’t know which was worse.

“CMO’s log, Stardate 2264.96. It’s been eighteen days of searching every god forsaken planet we’ve come across and we haven’t found a god damn thing in this black hell hole up here. No sign of Jim or his shuttle, or the god damn idiots who attacked us in the first place. And now Jim’s out there, in god knows what state, on some god damn planet, and surrounded by who knows what kind of bacteria and infectious diseases. And the damn med kit on that metal death trap he was in ain’t got nearly enough supplies for fifteen people to survive on for more then two weeks, and it’s been longer then that already! If we don’t find them soon then… damn it! We need to find him! I need the kid back more then I even knew, actually… maybe I did know, I just couldn’t say it. God, I wish I had… to hell with this! I need a drink.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little more angst, and next is the chapter I’m pretty excited about…. the Bones centered chapter!! XD
> 
> But I also thought I’d let you guys know that I had a bit of a revelation this morning lol. While trying to update this fic for y’all I decided that I’m going to slightly alter the original path I had outlined for this. Not so much alter but rather add to. So, this fic is probably going to be a little longer then I originally anticipated, but who doesn’t love a good long Mckirk fic? lol
> 
> Anyways, hope you guys enjoyed this update, hopefully more to come soon!! And as always your wonderful thoughts are always welcomed, and thanks for reading! <3


	5. Chapter 5

Leonard slammed a fist on his desk and ran the other hand down his face, ending the comm. He couldn’t take much more of this. If someone didn’t find Jim soon he was going to have some kind of nervous break down, in fact, he was surprised he hadn’t had one already. 

He decided to take himself up on that drink and left his office, not even giving a wave to anyone at the nurse’s station as he stalked past. He was on his way to his room when that old saying popped violently into his head, playing over and over again, “you don’t know what you got till it’s gone,” and hell if that weren’t true. 

He’d known Jim Kirk since the day he sat next to him on the shuttle in Riverside, and he’d be the last to admit that there had been something between them right from the get go, but now he wished he had. He’d spent years trying to convince himself that what he felt for the kid wasn’t anything more then friendship, but after a few close calls he started to realize that maybe he couldn’t keep up that charade for much longer. Now Jim was missing, and every emotion that he had tried for all those years to push down and ignore, because ain’t no way the kid would have feelings for a grumpy old man like him, came quickly flooding back to him, pushing him into a sort of self destructive spiral. 

It started slow. The first few nights Jim was missing he had spent them locked up in his room, trying to quell the frequent panic attacks that were suddenly plaguing him. Thoughts and visions filled his head of Jim dying in so many different ways. Jim floating in space, mangled in the shuttle crash, by infection, by dehydration or starvation… alone. The thoughts quickened his heart and tightened his chest, but no matter what he did he couldn’t vanquish the thought of Jim dying alone and without knowing what he should have told him years ago. 

He had hoped that throwing himself fully into the rescue efforts for Jim and the cadets would maybe help deter these thoughts, but it only made them worse. Each day he would join Spock, Nyota, and a few other members of their crew in mapping out different routes and possible locations. Only, when Leonard started seeing for himself what kinds of planets Jim could have landed on, he was sure one of his panic attacks would turn into a heart attack. As he stood motionless and silent in the ready room off the bridge, looking at pictures and listening to Spock talk about different planets along the shuttles possible routes, “volcanic planet,” “made up of 87.65% water,” “host to a race of hostile inhabitants,” and more, Leonard could hardly contain his very high, and quickly rising, level of anxiety.

He managed to hide it fairly well during these meetings with Jim's rescue crew. Holding the emotions inside and saving his attacks for when he was in the privacy of his own room, alone, where he could drown his fears in a glass of bourbon. And that’s where it quickly went down hill, and fast. What started off as his usual one or two glasses a night, turned into three, then four, and eventually he found that even the entire bottle couldn’t stop the scenes from running through his mind. 

Now, eighteen days into searching for Jim and again coming up empty handed, he found himself sitting on his couch, having already emptied bottle number one, and half way through bottle number two. And even that didn’t seem to be enough tonight.

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Lieutenants log, Stardate 2264.96. It has been eighteen days and still no sign of the captain or our missing cadets. I have sent out alerts in all areas of the quadrant in all native languages as well as several foreign ones, and still no one has reported seeing our missing shuttle or crew members...”

Nyota sighed, running a hand down her face. She had been on the bridge for she didn’t know how long, composing alerts and translating them into as many languages as she knew in an attempt to find Jim, or at the very least have someone come forward with some information that could lead them in the right direction. At this point they were grasping at straws and practically guessing when it came to searching planets. They might as well have closed their eyes and thrown a dart at a map. They had no idea where the shuttle had even gone, and no one in this entire quadrant seemed to know either. 

She ended her comm and turned back to the screen where she was working on her latest translation. The bridge had been quiet all shift, everyone solely focused on finding their missing captain and crew. 

She heard the rush of air as the turbo lift doors opened and closed, and heard the footsteps as they walked steadily across the bridge and stopped behind her. Though she didn’t turn around and instead continued her work. 

A gentle hand touched her shoulder, an attempt to gain her attention. “Lieutenant,” the steady voice of their acting captain broke through the silence, “have you been here for both shifts?”

She turned to face Spock, realizing now that the bridge crew behind him were not the faces her usual shift crew. Quickly turning back to her screen and looking at the time she sighed and slumped back in her chair, “Yeah, I guess I have.”

Spock leaned over her slightly, looking at the screen, “Are you sending out another alert about the captain and the cadets?”

“Yes.”

“How many have you sent out?” 

“Not including the thirteen native languages of this quadrant…” she thought for a moment, “this will be the eighth.”

“What language?”

“This one’s in Klingon.”

“May I?” She gestured to the screen and pushed her chair to the side so Spock could better view the message. He leaned fully forwards and began reading the text, “Attention Klingon citizens in the Omarian quadrant. This is the crew of the Enterprise asking for your help. On Stardate 2264.78 a shuttle manned by our captain and fourteen cadets was ambushed by an unknown source and chased out of sight of our ship. Those cadets as well as our captain, James Tiberius Kirk, are still missing. We are asking anyone with any information on their whereabouts, or regarding the attack, to please contact the Enterprise immediately. Our family would appreciate any assistance you can give.” 

When he finished reading the passage, he backed away and turned to her, hands folded behind his back, “Do you think the Klingons would help us if they did hold information pertinent to the captain’s rescue?”

She shrugged, “It’s worth a shot at this point. So far everything else has been a bust.”

“You do have a point, Lieutenant.” She nodded in response and Spock watched as her head slowly began to fall into her chest. He placed his hand on her shoulder again, jolting her from her half asleep state, “Come, Lieutenant, you must rest. If any information is discovered I will contact you immediately.”

“No,” she said as she stood from the chair and Spock began gently guiding her towards the lift, “Spock, I have a few more languages I wanted to translate that message into. Just-”

“Nyota,” he stopped her with a hard look, “we will be no help to Jim, the missing cadets, or the rest of the crew if we are not well rested. Get some rest and we can continue the translations tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” she nodded, getting into the lift, “you're right. I’ll be here tomorrow morning to continue the translations.”

Spock gave a nod as the doors closed and she ordered the lift to her deck. In seconds the lift doors opened again and she slowly made way to her room. She was just about there when a familiar blonde head of hair came towards her from down the hall. 

“Christine, what are you doing up so late?”

“Emergency surgery on one of the engineering crew,” she huffed a breath and rubbed her already red eyes, “I was actually already off shift and in bed when M’benga called me in to help.”

“Doesn’t doctor McCoy usually take the reigns on these kinds of things?” She quirked a brow and crossed her arms, “At the very least he's usually present during the surgery.”

“That’s just the thing,” she shrugged, “no ones been able to get him on comms. He left the sickbay around noon without telling anyone and no ones heard from him all day.”

“That’s odd.”

Christine rubbed a hand up her arm, shifting slightly closer to whisper to Nyota, “I'm worried about him, Ny,” she stepped back, not sure if she should disclose this next bit of information to a lieutenant, but she needed to tell someone and she didn’t think that someone should be Spock, considering his track record with Leonard, “I keep finding empty bottles of alcohol all over his office, he's leaving shift early, I don’t think he's done a surgery or even an exam on anyone in weeks, he won’t talk to anyone, spends most of his time in his office gaping at those maps. I know this all has to do with Jim going missing, and believe me we are all feeling the loss right now, but I'm afraid he's spiralling into something he won’t be able to pull himself out of and soon it might… it might get really bad if someone doesn’t pull him out.”

“You’re right,” she nodded, “what's his room number? I’ll check on him.”

Christine pulled up the padd in her hand and tapped away for a second before looking back to Nyota, “Room, 226.”

“Ok, I'm on my way,” she turned to head back to the lift before calling out, “I’ll comm you when I’ve got him.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

Nyota arrived at room 226, the room of her good friend Doctor Leonard McCoy. She knocked and waited, looking around the deserted hallway. It was long past midnight and the ship was eerily quite as she waited. When she heard no answer or rousing from the other side she knocked again, this time shouting, “Leonard, I know you’re in there, please let me in. I know this change in you is because of Jim but we can talk it out, just open the door. People are worried about you.”

Still no one answered and she would admit that she was starting to get worried too. She took another look around the halls, making sure she was still alone, before quickly hacking into the lock pad beside Len’s door and breaking in. 

She entered to the room in complete darkness. She closed the door behind her and called out for Len but again there was no answer. She ordered the computer to turn the lights on and gasped when she was finally able to see. And what she was met with was a room full of countless empty bottles, a passed out doctor on the floor in front of the couch, and a bottle of half empty bourbon slowly leaking in his hand.

She ran over to him, turning him over and taking his face in her hands shaking him gently, “Leonard, wake up!” 

When all she got in response was a groan and a still unconscious Leonard, she grabbed her comm and called Christine. 

“Uhora!” Christine’s voice came through the comm, “Did you talk to Leonard?”

“Not exactly,” she grunted as she hauled the limp doctor off the floor and slung his arm over her shoulder, “meet me back in sickbay, find an empty room and prep a bed for me. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

Before anything else could be said she ended the call and began dragging Leonard across the room and slowly down the hall. He was no help to her at all, only grunting in protest at the upright position and occasionally shuffling his feet and throwing them both off balance. And after what seemed like a life time they finally made it to the lift that would take them to Christine. 

When she had first laid eyes on Leonard lying lifeless on the floor, her first thought was to call Spock. He was after all, their acting captain in Jim's stead, but when rethinking that strategy she decided against it. Spock and the doctor did not have the best past and she could only imagine the fight that would ensue when Spock found out that his chief medical officer had nearly drank himself into a coma. And with Jim being gone and tensions already on the rise, she was sure it would most likely end in a blood bath. Instead she decided it best to keep this incident quiet and leave Len in the trustworthy hands of nurse Chapel.

When the lift door opened Christine was already there waiting for them, eyes blowing wide upon seeing the limp state of Leonard hanging off uhora’s shoulder. She quickly ran inside the lift taking up Len’s other side and lead them all to the room she had prepped in the far back of the sick bay. 

They landed Leonard on the bed and shaded the windows before closing the door, leaving the three alone. 

“What happened?!” Christine instantly began scanning Leonard, checking all vitals while waiting for an explanation.

Uhora sighed, running a hand through her hair before answering, “Jim still missing has clearly put a strain on all of us in many different ways. I found him passed out in his room surrounded by empty bourbon bottles. I can’t even begin to guess how many bottles he drank before he passed out.”

Chapel ran a scanner over him, eyes on her padd. “He’s lucky you found him and not someone else.”

“Those were my thoughts exactly,” she nodded, “I thought about calling Spock for help but I thought maybe it would be best to keep this quiet.”

“You’re probably right.” She pulled the scanner away, placing it back in her pocket and put the padd on the bedside table before turning to Uhora, “He’ll be fine. Nothing I can’t fix with a few good hypos.”

Uhora smirked, crossing her arms and standing, “I’ll be back in the morning to talk to him when he’s more himself, so don’t let him leave this room until I get here.” Chapel nodded, “And you should get some sleep too, Christine. Don’t let this fool keep you up all night.”

“I will. Good night, Nyota.”

“Good night.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

For the first time in a long time Leonard woke up to a blinding headache. His eyes were so heavy and sore they didn’t even want to open, and sitting up was definitely not going to happen right now. 

He ran a shaking hand down his face trying to remember what happened. He remembered making it to his room, then soon after receiving a comm from Spock informing him that the mission had yet again been a failure, and they would have to move on to another planet to search for Jim. Next thing, he had a bottle of bourbon in his hand and the rest is a haze. 

Though he didn’t remember what happened he was sure he could put two and two together and figure it out, but how he had ended up in the sickbay would remain a mystery. 

As he rifled through his jumbled thoughts for an answer the door opened, letting in a little too much light for his over sensitive eyes, and he shot a hand up to cover them.

“Oh, is that too bright for you?” A woman's voice hit his ears and he groaned in response, “I'm sorry, let me just open it a little more then. Or how about I do you one better. Computer, lights one hundred percent!”

As more light flooded the room Leonard hissed and rolled onto his side, which was a horrible idea as he felt his stomach lurch with the motion. Though he was far too stubborn to blow his stomach contents, and also not willing to stand to run to the bathroom, and forced himself to get over the sudden wave of nausea.

He let out one more groan as his stomach screamed at him, along with his liver, and he slit his eyes open just enough to see a familiar figure standing before him, arms crossed. “Uhora. What are you doing here? And why am I here?”

“You don’t remember?” She spat, walking closer to him, “I had to drag your dumb ass here after I found you passed out on your floor last night! I had to pull Chapel out of her room after she already worked a double and assisted on an emergency surgery because you were nowhere to be found, just so she could save your sorry hide from dying of alcohol poisoning!”

Yep, it was just as he had suspected. He clutched his stomach as another wave of nausea hit him and he looked up at her, “Look, Uhora, I-”

She raised a hand to stop him, “I don’t even want to hear your lame excuse Leonard. I had every intention of coming in here this morning and being as sympathetic as I could, but I couldn’t do it. I know your situation is slightly different then the rest of us, but you're not the only one who’s effected by Jim's absence!”

His brows furrowed and he pulled himself up in the bed to sit up slightly, “What do you mean my situation is different?”

She met his confused eyes with ones filled with pity. “Leonard, I know how you feel about Jim, I think everyone knows.”

“How I feel about him?”

She moved to sit on the edge of the bed facing him, all sternness replaced with the sympathy she spoke of before as she placed a hand on his shoulder, “The two of you were made for each other. I’ve seen the way you look at him, and how he looks at you, I’ve seen the way you act around each other and I know it’s more then merely friendship between you. But Leonard, you have got to pull yourself together. Jim is out there somewhere, along with fourteen other cadets who all need our help. No doubt when we find them they are going to need their chief medical officer in top condition to patch them up, and Jim is surely going to need his Bones just the same way.” He laid his head heavily back on the bed, letting it all sink in as she continued, “If you love him as much as I know you do, you'll sober up and get ready for when we do find him. And when he does get back, you should probably do something about that unspoken bond between the two of you. If this is anything to learn from, it’s that our lives are too dangerous and unpredictable to wait until it’s too late.”

She gave his arm a pat and left him alone to wallow in her words. He sighed, thinking over what she had said and decided that as always, Uhora was right… about everything.

He rolled to his side again and searched the room for his comm finding it on top of his shoes beside the bed. He grabbed it and rolled to his back, holding the comm in front of his face, before taking a deep breath and speaking as calmly as he could. “CMO’s log, stardate 2264.97. It’s… it’s day nineteen now in our search for the captain, and I won’t lie… I am struggling with his absence. After some much needed words of wisdom from Lieutenant Uhora I’ve come to realize some things, or rather finally come to fully accept them. All I’ve got to say is we better find you soon, Jim, and we better find you alive, cuz I’ve got a lot to say to you kid… a whole hell of a lot.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A very Leonard heavy chapter XD And I hope y’all are still enjoying this despite the horrible things I do to our boys, but I promise there are some good times ahead!
> 
> And as always I would love to hear your kind thoughts, you're comments are what keeps me going! I love you guys <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is so late… I’ve had a shitty shitty weekend. But now it’s up and I cant wait to see what you guys think of this one!
> 
> SO MUCH FLUFF IN THIS CHAPTER! SO MUCH FLUFF!!

“Damn it kid, look what you do to me.” 

Leonard ran his thumb gently across the back of the hand he was still holding. He remembered waking up that day in the sickbay, he remembered his conversation with Uhora, remembered the feeling of acceptance that washed over him but also the fear of possibly never being able to admit that to the person who actually mattered. 

He looked over to Jim still unconscious in the bed, as lifeless as he had been when he was being rushed through the sickbay after Spock had finally found him. 

“Jim,” he began, nervously, “kid… you gotta wake up. You heard the log, I’ve got a lot of things to say and I want to be able to say them to your face. I don’t even care if you don’t… if you don’t feel the same, I just need to say it. I need you to know the truth. I don’t want another chance lost on us like this Jim, I-”

Tears clouded his vision and a lump filled his throat as he squeezed Jim's hand a little tighter. What were the words worth if Jim couldn’t even hear them?

The padd in his lap prompted him with a new log, this one belonging to Jim again, and a shaking finger touched the screen allowing Jim's voice to fill the room.

“Kirk’s log, stardate 2264.97. I buried them today Bones, all of them. I buried fourteen rookie cadets, kids, in the sand, on a planet we don’t even know, a planet that’s not even federation! Kids, Bones, they were all kids!” Leonard heard a muffled sound through the padd, he was sure it was a sob Jim was trying to cover, “I couldn’t just leave them lying there like that, it didn’t feel right. So… so I took a piece of metal from the wreckage and used it yesterday to dig out fourteen graves. The metal tore up my hands pretty bad but… a small price to pay for the indefinite price those cadets paid. And I don’t know if I’ll ever be found, but at least this way, whatever happens, I know I did my best to make sure those kids have some kind of peace. And if you do find me, Bones, or if somehow this comm makes its way back to you, will you let their parents know that I tried. I tried my best to keep them alive long enough but I just… I couldn’t do it. Not with the supplies I had, I just… god, Bones. Kids, they were all just kids…”

~~~~~~~~~~~

After a full day of digging fourteen graves, Jim laid down for one last sleep in his battered shelter, surrounded by his fallen crew members. The next morning he woke with the sun and began finally laying his cadets to rest. 

He started with the first fallen, Trever, their pilot. Then moved on to the second, VooHook, then Amanda, and Kent. One by one he pulled their lifeless bodies into their far too early graves, with ripped apart hands and still limping on his injured knee, until all fourteen graves were filled. And one by one he filled in each and every one of them. 

When he was finished it was mid day and Jim stood panting before the graves in the blazing hot sun. He stared down at them, the fourteen bumps of freshly turned ground at his feet, and fell to his knees in a crying lump. “I'm sorry,” he choked out around the uncontrollable sobs, “I let you all down and I'm so sorry. I’ll never be able to forgive myself for this. You all deserved better then me.” 

~~~~~~~~~~~

After Jim had said his goodbyes and cried until he couldn’t cry anymore, he gathered what little he could from the shelter, shoving it into the now empty medkit, and started making his way towards the lonely mountain. 

As he was walking he pulled out his comm and began talking, trying to keep his mind off of how far the mountain really was. “Kirks log, stardate 2264.97. I’ve started walking, Bones. I'm making my way towards the only other thing I can see besides desert, the single mountain. It’s definitely going to take me much longer then I was hoping with my injured knee, but I'm trying not to think about that so much.”

Jim paused, continuing to limp towards the mountain as he thought back to better times. To his times in the academy after Pike had finally set him straight, and to think on it now Jim realized he had a lot more then his captaincy to thank his mentor for. He thought back on meeting Bones on that shuttle in Riverside, to the first time he laid eyes on that grumpy old doctor who seemed to worm his way right into his closed off little heart in the blink of an eye. To the ship, his ship, and the crew that came with it, his family. To the good times and the bad times, and the times he managed to drag Bones’s argumentative ass along on away missions, just so he could hear the doctors ever present negative outlook on whatever crazed idea Jim had come up with. In fact, now that he really thought about it, a lot of his memories involved Bones. 

“Hey, Bones,” he chimed, glossy eyed as he sunk back into the memory, “remember when we first met? You were hiding in the bathroom on the shuttle in Riverside. I was bruised and covered in blood after Pike just pulled my ass out of an epic whooping, and you were drunk off your ass and fighting with the attendant on the shuttle, rambling on about your aviophobia.” He scoffed as he continued, “You know, I’ll never get over the fact that a man as terrified of flying as you ever joined Starfleet to begin with… but I'm damn glad you did. And on the bright side, you never did throw up on me.”

He chuckled at the thought. The entire flight to the academy was spent listening to the man beside him ramble on and on about everything and anything that could go wrong in space, sharing the flask the man had hidden in his jacket pocket, and praying that he wouldn’t end up with a lap full of the mans lunch by the end of it. But regardless of the fact that he was the most down trod man Jim had ever met besides himself, he couldn’t help but feel right away that they fit together better then any two beings in the entire universe. And he missed him so much right now.

“Remember,” He laughed trying to remember the exact words, “remember what you said to me that day, Bones, how you described space. You said, “space is disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence,”” he did his best to imitate the mans gruffy southern accent and looked around him at the vast amount of nothing before him, “ain’t that the truth. But no matter how this ends, Bones, I want you to know that I am thankful for you. I'm thankful for everything that brought us together in the end. For your ex wife who took the whole damn planet in your divorce, for the flight attendant who forced you to sit next to me on the shuttle, for the rooming snafu that ignored your request for a single room and landed you with me as a roommate instead, for being suspended and having my pouty ass hypoed and snuck onto the Enterprise by you. I feel like every being in the universe was always trying to bring us together, Bones, and by some god damn miracle we finally managed it after all those years. I just hope… I hope it doesn’t end on this sour note. I hope we pull off another miracle and I can find my way back to you. We’ve got a lot to talk about that’s for sure.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Hey, Bones.” It had only been a few hours since his last log, but his injured knee was starting to ache even more with the walking and Jim needed some kind of distraction, “Remember first year, it was second term, and you were all riled up about passing the shuttle exam? And you killed me in the shuttle crash?! I know I never let you live it down but you have to admit it was pretty damn funny.” He trailed off, laughing at the memory of it. “It was when we were just starting to become really close, closer then we already were at the time. And despite the fact that you crashed our shuttle a bunch of times it’s a really great memory for me. When we were in that shuttle together, alone, just the two of us, it was the first time we really touched, we… we held hands for the first time. And when we were in there together, I thought for sure… Bones, I thought you were going to say something, I thought you were going to tell me that-” he sighed, still not quite able to say it yet, “but you didn’t. Anyways, I uh, I was just thinking about that memory. I hope you remember it, Bones.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Just ease the shuttle out of the port, Bones.”

Jim sat beside Len, the two of them in their casual grey academy sweats and matching oversized hoodies, just the two of them after class hours. Len was in the pilots seat, hand wrapped around the control stick in a white knuckled grip as he did as Jim said, and tried to ease the shuttle out of the port. Jim gripped the arm of his chair as the shuttle stuttered out of port, past the few docked shuttles around them, and into open space.

“Good,” he nodded, “a little shaky, but good. Now, accelerate forwards at a nice pace and head for the planet’s surface.”

Len nodded without taking his eyes off the view screen, focused on his task while trying not to have a mental break down mid flight, like he had while his instructor was in the passenger seat a few days prior.

The shuttle continued at its slow and not so steady pace, and Jim was sure the planet was actually getting further away from them instead of closer. “Speed up a bit grandma or else we’ll die of old age before we even get there.”

Len's fingers gripped tighter around the control stick as he ground out around clenched teeth, “Jim, this is stressful enough as it is!

“Easy there, Bones” Jim chuckled, “but you do need to go a little faster, we’re in open space, and stop shaking so much, everything’s fine.

Len tried to take a steadying breath but what came out was more like a stutter. He chanced a glance down at his hand still clenched tightly around the control stick and noticed just how much he was shaking. 

He closed his eyes for a moment and shook his head. “You know I hate flying, kid. It’s not as easy as you make it sound to just relax while I'm holding not only my life in my hands, but now yours as well.”

Jim let go a small smile as his eyes travelled over to Len’s still shaking hands. Before he could stop himself he stretched his arm across and let his fingers trail gently down Len's arm, starting at his elbow and stopping at his wrist. He let his fingers linger on the back of Len's hand for a moment, tracing small circles on the skin there, before wrapping his hand around Len's and running his thumb soothingly over Len's and pushing the stick forwards into a slightly faster speed.

Without looking up he spoke to Len again, in an almost whisper, “You know I willingly give you my life, right, Bones.”

Len scoffed, “As a doctor, yes, but as a pilot you shouldn’t.”

“It wouldn’t matter the situation, Bones, I would trust you with my life regardless.”

“Kid,” Len shook his head again, “I'm the worst pilot the academy’s got. You’d be better off never getting into a shuttle with me, it’d probably be a hell of a lot safer.”

“You're not a bad pilot,” he continued to ease Len's hand forwards bit by bit as he continued, “you're just a little too high strung at times and over worrisome. You’ve just got to learn to let things go, whatever’s going to happen will happen, and as long as it happens with you and I together, then I'm ok with it.”

For the first time since they entered the shuttle Len took his eyes off the view screen to look at Jim. He didn’t know exactly what to say…well that was actually a lie. He did know what to say, but what he struggled with was how to say it. “Jim…”

Jim still refused eye contact, eyes focused on their hands as he whispered barely audible, “Yeah, Bones.”

“Jim, I-” before he could get it out the shuttle rocked violently to the side. Len's eyes widened in panic and Jim sat straight up in his chair. He removed his hand from Len's and kept his eyes fixed on the view screen. “Jim, what was that?!”

“You’re the pilot, you tell me.”

“I thought you were supposed to be helping me!” Len was in full panic mode. His hands flew across the controls, trying desperately to locate the source of the hit, and stop the deafening alarms from going off around them.

“I am helping you, Bones,” Jim’s voice remained calm and collected, and it flustered Len even more, “this is a great time for a lesson.”

“It sure as hell is not!”

“It sure as hell is!” Jim shot back full of enthusiasm, “Now tell me what's happening, and quick before we’re hit again.”

Len's hands continued to move across the controls before he sat back, face pale and eyes wide, “We’re in an asteroid field!”

“Yes we are!” Jim sat back and crossed one leg over the other, turning slightly towards Len, “Now what do you do?”

Len turned to Jim, annoyed at the very collected and undisturbed kid beside him and growled, “How are you so calm?!”

Jim merely ignored the question and asked the same one again, “What do you do, Bones? I know you know the answer.”

He huffed a breath and searched his memory, thinking back to class and what his instructor had told him before stuttering out, “I… I pull up a view screen of the field to help navigate through it and then… land on the nearest safe surface until I can get aid.”

With out so much more than a nod Jim said, “Then do it.”

Len turned back to the controls and brought up the view of the asteroid field on the screen, and quickly tried to navigate a path through the debris towards the planet he was originally headed for. His frantic movements caught Jim's eye and he reached over and placed a firm hand on Len's shoulder. 

“Relax, Bones.”

“Kid…” Len was sure that if he gripped the control stick any tighter with his right hand it would mould to his skin, but he just couldn’t bring himself to the calm level that was Jim Kirk.

Jim gave his shoulder a light squeeze, “You wanna get through this asteroid field then you have to have a calm steady hand and a clear mind. Just breathe.”

“Kid…” Len could feel every muscle in his body tensing despite Jim's words, “We’re gunna hit that huge asteroid!”

“Reverse thrusters, Bones, you can get through this field easily.”

Len found himself completely frozen as the asteroid was coming closer and closer. He couldn’t move any part of his body no matter how hard he tried, no matter how loud his brain yelled at his hand to reach across and activate the reverse thrusters, nothing was working. All he could do was stare straight ahead and think about the inevitable.

“Kid…” was all he could manage to choke out.

Jim gave Len's shoulder another squeeze, leaning closer to him, “You know how to do this, Bones, reverse thrusters.”

“Jim!” 

With Len completely locked up, the shuttle crashed hard with the large asteroid, shaking the entire shuttle as the view screen went black. The shuttle around them filled with a deep red hue and the alarms were replaced with a robotic female voice. 

“Away mission to class M planet, Maldova, failed. Shuttle destroyed on impact, all life forms aboard perished. Simulation end.”

The red hue was then replaced with the normal glow of artificial light as Len slumped back into his chair with a huff, rubbing at his eyes with both hands.

Jim shook Len's shoulder where his hand still held him tightly, as he breathed with a smile, “It’s ok, Bones.”

“No, no it’s not, Jim!” He threw his hands up in frustration, “I have another simulator test coming up in two weeks, and if I don’t pass this one I won’t be allowed to move into the next semester with you. I’ll be held back until I can pass this god forsaken test! Not to mention if this was a real life situation I would have killed you!” he sighed, “I'm a doctor damn it, not a pilot! Why do I have to learn how to fly?!”

“Every member of a ship has to know how to fly, no matter what their position is, everyone has to be certified. It’s Starfleet regulation. If something happened and every crew member was unable to fly except you, then we would all look to you to pilot.”

Len groaned, not even wanting to think about such a mess, “I'm never going to pass this test. I'm going to be held back and you’ll move on without me.”

Jim shook his head, “Not a chance, Bones.”

“Jim,” Len began in a firm voice, “you are not halting your education or dream of captaincy because this old man can’t pass a damn simulation test. It just means we won’t graduate together.”

“I'm not walking that stage without you.”

“Kid-”

Jim stopped him, looking Len directly in the eyes as he spoke his next words with sincerity, “Bones, I meant what I said before. No matter what the situation, I willingly lay my life in your hands.” Len could only stare at him in awe as he continued, “I would never give that trust to anyone else, only you. And I can’t do that if I'm in space and you're still grounded. No one else on any ship, or anywhere in the universe, would be worthy enough of that trust, and I don’t want anyone else, I only want you. And if that means that I have to stay here with you for another year and wait while you pass the test, or two years, or ten years, even if we never leave earth, I will wait right here beside you, Bones. I am not going into space without you, do you understand?”

Len didn’t know what to say. All he could do was stare and nod to let Jim know that he did understand, but what he wanted to say was how much Jim's words had meant to him. After a hardened childhood and a shitty marriage followed by an equally shitty divorce, Len was starting to think he would never know compassion again. But sure enough, Jim Kirk had some how managed to flip his entire life view around and flutter his heart like a love sick teenager, despite the hard exterior he worked so hard on.

“Good,” Jim smiled, leaning away from Len, “but I'm not going to let you fail. We are going to work on this until you feel comfortable with it.”

While Len continued to stare at Jim, he turned away and started rebooting the simulator to play a random mission. While his hands worked the controls Len reached forwards and caught Jim's hand in his, holding it firmly, linking their fingers together and giving them a squeeze. Jim stopped all movements and looked to Len, waiting for him to say something.

“I...” He began, “Thanks, Jim, for sticking with me, it means a lot.”

Jim returned the squeeze and smile, and when Len let go they both found their hands feeling very empty. A want to pull back and never let go washing over the both of them, but neither knowing how to go about that. So Jim decided instead to turn back to his work and busy himself with rebooting the simulator, and less then a minute later they found themselves looking through the view screen at the now very familiar port.

“Ok, Bones,” Jim settled back into the chair once again and explained Len's new mission, “this time you're rescuing a stranded four man crew stalled in open space. You’ve got to locate them, bring your shuttle to rest beside them without jostling them further into space, and engage the boarding tube so they can safely leave their ship and board ours. Got it?”

“Got it,” he confirmed with a nod.

“Great.” A smirk quickly found its way onto Jim's face as he turned to face Len, “And this time don’t forget to watch out for oncoming debris or danger, don’t get distracted while ogling my fine self again.”

Len just reached over and gave Jim's shoulder a shove. Jim burst out laughing, and as much and Len tried to give the kid his signature scowl he just couldn’t, and ended up laughing along with him. He spared him one last glance, Jim's face bright with laughter and Len couldn’t help but think how much he loved that smile on Jim kirks face, what he wouldn’t give to have it always there and only for him. 

As the shuttle pulled further out of the port he returned his eyes reluctantly to the view screen. Taking the shuttle out into open space, this time with more confidence and less of a shake to his hands, as Jim's laughter beside him filled the shuttle.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Len ran his thumbs over Jim's fingers, his hand still tightly held in his while Jim still lay unconscious beside him. “How could I forget, kid,” and how could he. 

He remembered that day perfectly, as if it were yesterday. The day Jim had not only sent a whirlwind of shivers through his body with his touch, and held his hand, but it was also the day that Jim had given his whole self to Len. After knowing Jim for close to a year at the time, Len knew that Jim was not one to trust others easily if even at all, and for Jim to openly and completely give that trust to Leonard was a feeling he could not explain. Jim's declaration of trust meant more to him then the universe itself. 

Looking at the padd revealed yet another one of Leonard's logs. He pulled Jim's hand into his lap, still not letting go, and opened the next file.

“CMO’s log. Stardate 2264. 98. Its been two days now since lieutenant Uhora found me in a heap in my room. One day since I woke up in the medbay an absolute mess. I will admit that… that Jim's disappearance has taken a huge toll on me. I’ve never been this long without the kid and once we get him back, and we will get him back, I will do everything in my power to personally make sure Jim never leaves my side again. Protocol be damned! But after yet another hard day with news of another planet coming up empty, it was the lieutenant’s words that helped me get through the night without another incident. Uhura was right, we can’t help Jim if we can’t even help ourselves.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I warned you… FLUFF!!! ok, getting into some flashbacks now as Jim’s journey across the empty planet begins… more good times to come XD
> 
> Let me know what Y’all think <3 Love you guys!!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter is a bit longer, but I think you’ll find it well worth it! *wink*

Len found himself in the same spot he had been pacing nearly everyday for the last two and a half weeks, and Scotty was sure that if he didn’t stop the doctor would ware a hole in the floor of the transporter room. Scotty watched from his chair as the doctor did circle after circle, eyes wandering between the transporter padd and the screen in front of him before he finally spoke, “Doctor McCoy?” Len stopped for a brief moment to look to Scotty, “Might it be better if you waited back in the medbay, or your chambers? I can call ya when they get back.”

Len shook his head and continued his pacing, “Spock said they wouldn’t be more then a day, it’s been two, what the hell’s taking so long?! Has anyone had any communication with them at all?!” 

“Sorry, Leonard,” Scotty shook his head, “I tried calling them yesterday and nothin’. I'm sure they’ll be back any minute now, so why don’t you head down to your office and I’ll call ya, you need rest doctor. You look a mess.”

“I am a mess!” he shouted, though he hadn’t intended to yell at Scotty. But after nearly three weeks now of built up anger and impatience he couldn’t help it. “We’re going on three weeks Jim's been missing and no one seems to know a damn thing about where he went! I can’t take much more disappointment, I just want to know where he is-”

As it all came boiling over Len felt the all too familiar clench in his chest, the rush of air being forced out of his lungs as if he had been punched. He leaned against the wall behind him and slid down to the floor, wrapping both arms around himself as he tried hard to catch his breath. 

“Right, hod on, doctor!” Scotty was at his side in seconds, sitting beside him, and instructing Len to match his breathing to his own, “I know it’s hard, but we’ll find him, Len, we will. You’ve just got to have a wee bit of hope. Jim's a smart man, I'm sure where ever he is he's just fine and waiting for his doctor to come rescue him.”

Len looked up at Scotty, his breathing slowly coming back to normal, but before he could say anything the screen lit up and Spock's voice filled the transporter room, “Spock to Enterprise.”

Scotty jumped up from his spot beside Len and landed himself in the chair, “Scott to Spock, you ready?”

“Lock on and beam us up.”

“Aye, one moment.” 

Len watched from his place on the ground as the padd lit up. He counted the figures as they came in and it didn’t look like they had any more people then they beamed down with.

As they walked off the padd Spock eyed Len and shook his head. All Len could do to avoid another panic attack was pull his knees to his chest and burry his face in his arms. But he could still hear Spock and Nyota as they spoke to Scotty off to the side.

“What took so long?”

“When we entered the planet’s city centre there was someone there who thought they had information for us,” Nyota sighed, then continued, “but it was a dead end. It was a completely unrelated incident.”

“I see,” Scotty ran a hand over his face and crossed his arms. His eyes wandered over to Len still huddled against the wall. He turned back to Nyota and nodded his head towards Len and whispered, “I don’t know what to do wee him. While yous are gone he comes in here and damn near wears a hole in the floor, and this time he went into a fit. Thought he was gunnae stop breathin’. He cannae take much more o’this, none of us can really.”

“I know,” Nyota turned towards the still unmoving Len and placed a hand on Scotty’s shoulder, “I’ll get him back to his room.”

“And I shall make way to the bridge. Perhaps some information came in while we were off ship.”

Spock and Scotty both left the transporter room leaving only Nyota and Len. She slowly walked over to him and knelt down in front of him. She placed her hand on his arm and rubbed her thumb back and forth a moment before she placed her other hand on his shoulder and helped him off the ground. “Come on, Leonard, let’s get you to your room.”

Without a word Len got up and allowed her to lead him through the halls.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Before Len even knew it he was standing in front of his door.

“Ok, in you go, Leonard,” Nyota’s soothing voice came from behind him, “just go to bed and hopefully we’ll have good news tomorrow. If anything happens you know I’ll call you.”

He nodded mindlessly as he opened the door, then turned back to Nyota, “He's… he’s not coming back.”

“Don’t say that, Leonard.”

“I have to face this at some point, Nyota, I can’t…” he stopped to take a calming breath, “I can’t keep hoping that he's going to walk off the transporter padd and come running into my arms. He's been missing for nearly three weeks and we have no information, not a damn thing. And there’s no way his shuttle travelled this far away from the original attack point. He's gone.”

Len was near tears now and Nyota could see it. She could see the quick rise and fall of his chest and knew he was close to another attack. Running soothing hands down his arms she took a step closer, “There’s always hope.”

“Yeah,” he scoffed, “people keep telling me that but I'm damn near out of hope at this point. Reality is what we need to face now.”

“And the reality is that Jim is the best man that Starfleet has, and if anyone could have survived this attack and found somewhere to hold down until rescue, it’s Jim.” She gives his arms a squeeze and says with confidence, “I know it looks bleak but we’ll find him, even this far out. We’ve mapped out a few more planets they could have made it to, and we will find him on one of them, I know it. And he will walk off that padd and he will come running into your arms, I promise.”

He shakes his head, “You can’t promise me that, no one can.”

“Leonard, you know Jim better then anyone else. Deep down do you really think he's gone?”

“I… I don’t want to.” He starts and she stares him down, knowing that was a half assed answer at best, “No, I don’t think he's dead, but I'm so drained, Ny. Every time you head down to a planet I get my hopes up and every time I'm disappointed. I can’t take much more of that. I just… I need Jim.”

“I know,” she rubs his arm again, “we all do. But he is out there and we will find him, alive. And when we do if you two don’t get over this ridiculous tension, or shyness, or whatever it is between you, and finally admit your feelings for each other after all this, so help me god, Leonard, I will do it myself.”

He chuckled, but he knew she was right. If… when they got Jim back he was laying it all out on the table. He wasn’t going to let another chance slip away from him, and he certainly wasn’t going to risk losing Jim again without telling him everything.

Nyota gave him a small smile then turned him towards the door, “Get some rest, Leonard, I’ll see you in the morning.”

He nodded and walked inside without another word.

~~~~~~~~~~~

After the door closed behind him Len stood there for a few minutes just staring at the floor. Nyota was right, Jim was still out there somewhere and they would find him, but the wait was killing Len slowly, agonizingly. 

Without even thinking about what he was doing he wandered over to the liquor cabinet in his sitting area, and found himself with a bottle of bourbon in his hand. He popped the lid off and was just about to put the bottle to his mouth when he remembered what had happened the last time. He remembered Nyota's words to him the next morning in medbay. When they found Jim, he would need him to be the best he could be, sober and ready to give Jim whatever he needs. 

Without taking a sip he dropped the bottle to his side and walked over to the sink. No hesitation, he poured the entire bottle down the drain and placed the empty bottle on the counter, and with a new found determination he marched over to the cabinet and started removing bottles by the armful. One by one he dumped all of it down the sink, emptying the cabinet completely, and with a sigh he left the kitchen and walked straight to his room.

He didn’t even bother changing, just sat on the bed and ran both hands down his face. When he looked up he was staring at the only picture he had in his room, one single frame perched in a place of pride on his nightstand. Len had purposefully placed it there when they were assigned to the Enterprise so he could look at it every night before bed, and it would be the first thing he saw when he woke every morning. It’s his favourite picture in the world, a memory of happier times. It’s a picture from when he and Jim had visited his Gran, back when they were still in the academy. 

His Gran had called him near the end of their second year. She would call every week to hear about Len's school, about his cute and funny room mate Jim, and sometimes Jim would scoot him out of the chair and talk to his Gran for hours. But this time she had called from the hospital. Len’s Gran had been having more and more health problems lately but she insisted that it was nothing, just a small bout of pneumonia, she had said. 

He thought back to their conversation that day, Len worried and Gran brushing it off like she always did, insisting she was perfectly fine… 

“I am fine, Lenny, don’t you go worrying about me.” 

Len sighed and shook his head, “I always worry about you, Gran. You're calling me from your hospital bed, how am I not supposed to worry!?”

“You just focus on those exams you have coming up and make your Gran proud,” She pointed at the screen, “no fussin’ over me.”

“Gran,” he pinched the bridge of his nose, “if I talk to your nurse, Karen, is she going to tell me I have to come down there?”

“You know if it was serious Karen would have called you herself,” and she was right, he knew it, “but speaking of, it’s been a long damn time since I’ve gotten a visit from my favourite grandson.”

He chuckled, “I'm you're only grandson.”

“Still my favourite,” she smiled, “now, about that visit…?”

Len turned away from the computer for a moment. He wanted to visit his Gran, he really did, but there was just something in him that couldn’t allow him to leave Jim.

As if she could read his mind she asked, “Is it Jim?”

Turning back he nodded, “Yeah, Gran. I don’t know what it is exactly but… I just can’t leave him.”

The door opened then and Len turned to see Jim walking through the small hallway, toeing off his boots as he did. He waved to Len with a huge smile on his face and walked towards him shouting, “Guess who’s last lecture was cancelled and now has the whole night off!”

Len laughed at him dancing through the living room and towards him, “I'm guessing the horribly dancing cadet in my living room.”

“You love my horrible dancing,” he continued to sway his hips towards Len who leaned back in the computer chair with a smirk. When he got almost close enough to sit in Len's lap he saw the computer screen out of the corner of his eye, “Is that Gran!?”

“It sure is, Jimmy my boy!” she smiled at him, “How are you doin? Good grades I hope.”

“Nothing but A’s, Gran,” she gave a little fist pump and Jim sat in Len's lap to better see her, looking around her, “are you in the hospital?! What happened?!”

“See, I'm not the only one that worries about you, Gran,” Len smirked from over Jim's shoulder, leaning his head there and wrapping his arms around the fidgeting body in his lap.

“Well neither of you should, I'm fine,” both boys gave her a knowing eye roll, “but enough of that. Jimmy, I was just trying to talk Lenny into coming out to visit me the next time y’all have some time off school. What would you say to coming along?”

Jim's eyes went wide, “You… you want me to come visit you in Georgia?”

“If you want to,” she smirked then said, “and it would seem that my little Lenny has an awful soft spot for ya, doesn’t want to leave without ya.”

Jim turned his head to try and hide the blush and Len couldn’t even believe his Gran. “I don’t want to impose on you guys. You should have your family time.”

“Nonsense,” she waved him off, “you wouldn’t be imposing, no such thing. I want you here and so does Lenny. You are family Jimmy, you belong here, and you're more then welcome to come along if you want to. But I do hope you say yes.”

Jim's smile brightened tenfold as he answered enthusiastically, “In that case I would love to come! I’ve never been to Georgia.”

“Well now, that’s a damn shame son,” she pointed to Len behind Jim, “while you're out here you better show him all the ropes, you hear, full Georgia experience, and I’ll make you all my famous dishes.”

Len shifted his head again to try and get a word in over Jim's shoulder, “We’ll have some time off after exams, Gran, so if you're home by then we’ll head out once exams are over. We’ll have two weeks off before we have to be back.”

“That sounds great boys, I’ll see y’all then!”

“Bye Gran, feel better,” both Len and Jim waved to her as she blew a kiss and ended the call…

Thinking back on the memory Len laughed. After that call with Gran, Jim spoke of nothing else for the next three weeks leading up to exams. It was the most excited he had ever seen the kid and he thought it was adorable. 

Len ran his fingers over the picture in his hands. Gran had taken that picture on their first night in Georgia. The minute their last exam was over Jim was ready and waiting for Len inside their room, bags packed, and shoes on waiting by the door. They hopped on a shuttle and arrived at his Gran’s house late afternoon. When the sun went down Len had dragged Jim outside and started a fire, then the two of them laid in the grass and spent hours looking up at the stars together, clear as day in the Georgia sky. 

It was night one of their two week stay in Georgia, and Gran must have snuck outside to snap this picture. Len was lying on the ground, one arm behind his head and the other around Jim. Jim was using half of Len's chest and his arm as a pillow, wrapped in Len's oversized high school football jacket, smiling and pointing towards the sky. The glow from the fire lit up their faces and Len couldn’t help but think Gran had captured the perfect moment. Jim in all his wonder filled glory, and Len staring at him like he hung the moon and stars. 

That trip back home was the best two weeks of Len's life. Two weeks spent with Jim, two weeks of no class and no work, two weeks of just being together. And now that he thinks back on it, two weeks completely wasted. He was given so many opportunities in Georgia to tell Jim how he really felt, and out of fear he let them all pass him by. Now, he couldn’t help but think that maybe if he had told Jim back then, just grew a pair and told Jim how he felt, maybe things would have turned out differently. Maybe Jim wouldn’t have been so stubborn and let him on that shuttle, instead of heading off alone with fourteen fresh cadets. Then at least, they would still be together now, rather then Jim being god knows where, and Len laying in bed clutching desperately to precious memories. 

He lay back in his bed clutching the picture tightly to his chest thinking back on all the chances he had back then. So many opportunities wasted, and he swore then and there, that if someone would give him the chance again he wouldn’t pass it up this time. Jim would know, as he should have known back then in Georgia.

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Turkey dinner, peach pie for dessert, and the best damn grandma anyone could ask for?! Bones, if you would have told me how amazing Georgia was, we would have come sooner.”

Len just chuckled at Jim sitting on the couch across form him. In the mere two days they had been at his Gran’s farm in Georgia, Jim had certainly made himself at home. Not that Len or anyone else was complaining. His Gran loved Jim. Yeah, she had spoken to Jim over video calls before, and she always loved chatting with him, but seeing the two actually interact with each other was priceless. Not to mention Len was loving relaxed and carefree Jim Kirk. Usually the kid was running back and forth across campus morning, noon, and night. Taking on extra classes, joining extra curricular’s, and Len was lucky if he could pin the kid down for more then fifteen minutes before he was either running off to his next class, or promptly passing out on the nearest flat surface in their room. Social life be damned, apparently.

But in good old Georgia, with no classes or crazy course loads, no late night medbay shifts or 2am emergency surgery calls, he was actually able to spend proper time with Jim and they were both finally able to breathe. And he noticed that Jim was taking full advantage of the fact that the next two weeks were completely wide open and stress free. No class, no obligations, no work, just him and Len and sweet little Gran. 

“Yeah, well don’t get used to it, kid. When we get back to the academy don’t expect me to dote on your every whim like Gran.” Len then shot a look at his Gran across the room. She was sitting in her rocking chair, smiling at the two of them. “Which you shouldn’t do, Gran, by the way. He's like an animal, if you keep feeding him he’ll never leave.”

Jim threw one of the couch pillows across the room at Len, hitting him in the side of the face. Len launched the pillow right back, Gran laughing along with the two of them.

“Nonsense,” she laughed, “I'm just glad to have two wonderful boys in the house to spend my time with. And you, my beautiful grandson, I haven’t seen you smile like this in a very long time.”

She reached over and took his chin in her hand, giving his face a squeeze and a little shake. When she let go he smiled and his eyes trailed across the room to Jim, and when their eyes made contact his smile beamed even brighter than before. 

Gran watched the two of them, had been now for the last two days, and she was no dense woman. She had raised Leonard from the time he was knee high to a grasshopper. She knew the life he had lead up until now. She knew of the hardships he had faced from such a young age. And she knew that the reason why Len's attitude and entire outlook on life had done a complete u-turn, was because of the very handsome blond haired boy currently sitting on her living room couch. 

The two never took their eyes off of each other, just stared between themselves like no one else was there. But as said before, she knew her grandson and she knew him well, which meant that she knew if she didn’t do something about the tension between them, her head strong grandson certainly wouldn’t. And in her opinion it had already gone on for two years too long.

A quick turn of her head brought her attention to the old record player in the corner of the room. A rare collectable Leonard had bought her for her birthday one year, along with a small box of vinyl’s to go with it. Standing, she motioned to the two boys, pulling them from each others eyes and said, “Move this table for me, would you boys?” as she sauntered over to the record player and began fiddling with it.

The two got up without question and shoved the table out of the way against the back wall, leaving the room now wide open. 

“What are we doing, Gran?” Jim quirked a brow and Len returned to his seat. 

“We, dear boy,” she turned as she got the player working and an old song played through the room, “are going to teach you how to do the quick step.”

“Alright!” Len chuckled at Jim’s enthusiasm, watching from his seat on the couch with a smile as his Gran began leading Jim around the living room.

He remembered when he was younger, on the good days when it was just him and his Gran at home, and she would put on music and lift him onto her toes. She would swing him around the living room just like she was right now with Jim, and it was one of the very rare times she was able to pull a smile from Len. Of course, after many years since then and a significant dip in her health, she couldn’t move as fast as she used to but she was still as graceful as ever. And Jim, despite his obvious two left feet, never faltered her step and was somehow managing to pick up the steps fairly quickly. Even managing to swing Gran out for a twirl and pull her back in for a dip in Len’s direction. Len laughed and clapped for their performance as they continued to move around their makeshift dance floor. Jim laughing and swaying his hips to the beat of the music.

Halfway through the song Gran caught Len's eyes over Jim's shoulder. She sent him a look and a nod in Jim's direction, a look that she had given him many a time before that meant “pick up your feet, boy!” and Len merely shook his head. Of course she would have an ulterior motive for the impromptu dance session, of course it involved getting Len to finally make a move on Jim, and of course she would have already figured out that Len would need a shove in the right direction to do so.

So Len waited until Jim's back was to him again and stood. Gran saw him, and waited until Len was in the perfect position, then quickly turned in Jim's hold and twisted Jim around and snuck away from him. Leaving a very confused Jim halfway through a twirl and partner-less, until he found himself being quickly pulled into a pair of strong steady arms, flawlessly being swept back up into the motions of the dance. 

Len took the lead and Jim easily followed, the two dancing and laughing through the rest of the song. Gran took a step back to watch, loving the bright smile on her grandson’s face, a smile that even reached up to touch his eyes. She knew from the very first time she spoke to Jim that he was something special to Leonard, she knew from the way Len would tell her about Jim when she called every week. They were made for each other and obviously both too damn stubborn to do anything about it. But she would be damned if she was gunna sit back and wait.

When neither of the boys were paying attention, Gran snuck up to the record player and swiftly switched the song, this time to a much slower one. She smirked as the two faltered at the sudden change in pace, their hands still clasped together, Jim's other arm around Len's neck and Len's holding Jim firmly at the waist. They stopped moving, both of them awkwardly looking away from each other and standing very close. Len watched as his Gran gave him a nod, then silently left the two of them alone in the room closing the door behind her. 

Len smiled and shook his head again. He could always count on his Gran to give him a not so subtle push in the right direction. 

He let go of Jim, who still couldn’t make his eyes, and took a step back. Len held out his hand and as the smooth voice of Elvis began singing the sweet lyrics of “can’t help falling in love with you,” and Jim finally met his gaze as he smiled and asked, “May I have this dance?”

Jim smiled back and took Len's offered hand, allowing Len to twirl Jim once before pulling him in close, as close to his chest as he could manage, until there was nothing left between them. Len swayed them gently to the music, and as the song went on their steps began getting slower and smaller, until they had almost stopped moving. Len took the hand that was holding Jim's and placed Jim's hand around his neck, using his now free hand to lift Jim's face up to his. 

They were so close, closer then he had ever been to Jim. Their bodies were pressed tightly against each other, noses bumping and eyes half lidded as they stood almost motionless in the living room. While the song played on Len couldn’t help but think just how perfect the lyrics were for the two of them. He had fallen so hard and so fast for Jim Kirk right from day one, and he just couldn’t help it. No matter how many times he told himself it wasn’t the case, they were only friends, or that Jim would never love him back, in this moment he couldn’t help but think that maybe none of that was true. The way Jim was holding him, leaning flush up against his body and wrapped tightly around Len, one hand clutching his neck and the other wound into his hair, he wondered if maybe it were possible that Jim did feel the same way, maybe he could love and be loved by Jim after all. 

He decided then, as he ran a hand up Jim's back and felt the shiver that struck his whole body with the action, that he had to know. He needed to know how Jim felt, and he needed Jim to know how he felt. He couldn’t wait any longer and decided to go for it, he was finally going to make his move. The song was coming to an end and it was now or never. Their faces were already so close, noses touching and breath mixing between them. Len shifted slightly, bringing their lips closer, almost touching. He heard Jim's breathing hitch when their lips brushed against each other, and all Len had to do was press the smallest distance forwards and he would finally be kissing Jim. He was almost there…

The fire alarm from the kitchen ripped through their moment, the two jumping in surprise with the sudden loud shrieking. After a moment to gather themselves they remembered that they were not alone and pulled away from each other in a panic, Gran was in the kitchen alone, and both went running through the door.

Gran was standing on a chair by the stove, frantically waving a towel back and forth in front of the alarm over head. Jim quickly sprung into action and ran to the stove turning off the burners and opening windows. Len followed Jim further into the kitchen and looked up to his Gran who shot him an apologetic look and whispered, “I'm sorry, Lenny.”

He just smiled at her, holding up a hand to help her down from the chair once the alarm stopped screaming at them. “What happened, Gran?”

“Well, I thought you and Jimmy might like some ice cream and custard,” she began, knowing full well already that she had ruined anything that might have had a chance of happening in that room between them, “turned my back for a second to grab the custard mix and the damn milk boiled over and started burning. I'm sorry, boys.”

Len gave her back a quick rub and Jim turned to shoot her a smile. “No worries, Gran, Bones and I will clean this right up for you.”

“Yeah, Gran, why don’t you go sit in the living room. We’ll be in once we’re finished.”

“You boys are too good to me,” she gave them both a pat on the arm as she walked past them and back into the living room, settling herself back into the rocking chair.

It wasn’t too long before both boys came back, ice cream in hand for the three of them. She may have accidentally ruined the moment earlier with the burning milk fiasco, but it didn’t miss her eyes when Jim sat on the couch next to Len this time instead of the other couch. She also didn’t miss when Jim pushed himself even closer to Len, so close that their sides were touching from shoulder to knee, and Len's neck and face turned a shade of red so deep her roses would be jealous. 

They finished off their second desert of the night and turned on an old movie, but she was less interested in that and more so in what was happening on the couch to her left. From the corner of her eye she watched as Jim, who was already pressed right up against Len, shifted impossibly closer and leaned his head on Len's shoulder. Not soon after, Len lifted his arm inviting Jim to curl in, which he took no time in doing, and held Jim close to his side, placing his free hand on Jim's thigh and rubbing small circles in the soft skin there. 

It may not have gone exactly how she had planned it, but she couldn’t help but think to herself, point one for Gran!

~~~~~~~~~~~

Len placed the padd on Jim's side table and took both his hands in his. “Do you remember that Jim? Dancing with me in the living room?”

With the padd and logs forgotten for now, Len dove deeper into those treasured memories back in Georgia. “I remember it as if it were yesterday. You and me, swaying to Elvis in Gram’s living room. I… almost kissed you that day, I wish I had, and every day after that I wanted to. I guess I just never got the nerve to actually go through with it, with telling you how I felt or kissing you.” He sighed, giving Jim's hands a squeeze, “I doubted it at first, assumed maybe I was just reading signals wrong, but after our visit with Gran I knew there was more between us then just friendship, but I never wanted to push you.”

Len chuckled. His Gran was right, they really were two stubborn and hard headed boys. “I guess both of us were waiting for the other to make the first move, and now look at us. I nearly went mad while you were missing and you're here unconscious and…” he took a steadying breath, “you're here and I can touch you, and feel you but I can’t… I can’t have you until you wake up, Jim. Just wake up for me, I don’t want anymore lost time between us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo getting into some sweet memories!! XD I’m looking forward to writing more of these!
> 
> Would anyone like a little sneak peak…? Ok then!
> 
> So things to look forwards to: Cowboy hats, possibly more dancing, and…… THE POND!


	8. Chapter 8

Len let go a hard sigh. It had been nearly two days since Jim had been found, two days of sitting in his room waiting for him to wake up, waiting to see those blue eyes again. He had spent the majority of it going through the logs that Spock had gave him, but he just couldn’t bring himself to listen to anymore, at least not right now. For the first time since Jim went missing Len was able to take his mind to a happier place, a place where it was him and Jim and nothing else mattered.

He ran a hand through his hair while his mind was still stuck on their time back in Georgia with Gran, and as his hand travelled into the back of his shirt it caught on something. He knew what it was, and all he could do was smile and close his eyes as the memories of their second day in Georgia flooded his mind.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Jim woke to the sun on his face on their second day in Georgia. He stretched out in the bed, letting the warmth of the sun coming through the window wrap around him for a moment before pulling himself out of bed.

He grabbed a shirt from the closet and shuffled across the hall into Len’s room, but he wasn’t there. The room was empty and the bed already made… no Bones.

With a pout and a furrowed brow he continued to shuffle down the stairs and towards the kitchen where he knew Gran was. He could hear the music playing and smell the food cooking, smiling when he walked in and Gran was dancing around the kitchen while she cooked.

“Good morning, Jimmy!” she sang as he took a seat at the island across from where she was standing.

“Mornin’,” he slurred as he rubbed his eyes, “where’s Bones?”

Gran grabbed a plate from one of the cupboards behind her and placed it in front of Jim, who was more then happy to oblige. “I had him make a run into town for me this morning. It’s Lenny’s birthday today, though I don’t think he’s even realized it yet. Poor kids always so wrapped up in worryin’ about me, he neglects himself.”

Jim laughed around a mouthful of scrambled eggs, “That’s right! The old mans twenty-nine.”

“Yes he is,” she chuckled, “I had him go into town and get me some groceries that included the supplies I’d need to bake him a cake, I also sent him for some home improvement items, and a few other things that should keep him occupied for most of the day. I invited a few friends over tonight to help us celebrate. So, the list I gave him should keep him away long enough for us to get things ready for tonight, and I should still have enough time to finish the cake before guests arrive. It’ll be a nice surprise for Lenny.”

Jim gave her a devious smirk, “Gran, you are sneaky!” she threw him a wink before he continued, “He should have brought me with him, and if I had known about the plan I could have kept him out longer.”

“He was going to wake you up this morning but he said you were sound asleep and looked like you could use the rest, he didn’t want to wake you,” she smiled at Jim, seeing the little bit of disappointment he was trying to hide in his eyes, then gave his hand a pat on the counter, “But I could use your help anyways. I’ve got some decorations in the garage I wanted to dig out before he gets back, and after that you can keep him occupied with some barn chores while I get everything else ready.”

“I’d love to!” He stood and placed his dishes in the sink before thinking about the small package he had hidden upstairs in his bag, “I hope he likes the gift I got him.”

“Oh, Jimmy,” she swooned slightly, “I know for a fact that Lenny would love anything you got for him, especially because it’s coming from you. What did you get him?”

Jim gave her a smirk, “Can’t tell, you’ll just have to wait and see.”

Gran gave an overdramatic gasp, “You won’t even tell your old Gran what you got him?” Jim just shook his head, giving nothing away, “You devil!” she laughed and swat him towards the back door, “Come on now, out to the garage with you!”

~~~~~~~~~~~

Gran opened the double doors to the oversized garage behind the house. Inside there were boxes upon boxes piled on top of each other, down both sides and in the centre of the garage, even up in the rafters. Jim stood in the doorway for a moment in awe before following Gran inside.

He picked up a few boxes looking inside and not finding anything remotely close to party decorations, “What exactly are we looking for here, Gran? Is there something that can help us find the decoration box a little faster?”

“I’m pretty sure I left it around this back corner over here,” she said pointing towards a very messy pile of boxes in the back, “haven’t used em’ in years, so I just hope they’re in good condition after all this time.”

Jim followed her back towards the pile she had pointed to but before he made it there, his eye caught something, and if he was right in what he thought it was, he was very excited.

He walked over and grabbed the cherry red tarp he had spotted and pulled. Jim was so excited over his findings that he nearly vibrated right out of his own skin. Before him stood the most beautiful bike he had ever laid eyes on. A deep cherry red with black edgings, double seat and road ready, he nearly fainted.

“You have a motorcycle?!” He spun around to Gran who was watching him with a fond smile.

“Yes,” she hummed as she walked closer, “this belonged to Lenny’s father. He loved this contraption, took it everywhere.”

“I had one back before I joined the academy, but nothing nearly as nice as this,” he ran his finger tips gently across the bike, entranced, “the keys are in the ignition.”

“Go ahead, Jimmy, see if it’ll start up.”

She stood back and watched as he tried a few times and it wouldn’t start, but after a little bit of tinkering from Jim, another few tries, and the bike roared to life under him. He whooped as the engine hummed and echoed through the garage, smiling wide as he revved it a few times, then turned it off and stood next to Gran.

“Well done, son!” she clapped his shoulder.

“That,” he pointed back to it, “is an awesome bike!”

“If you wanna take it out for a spin while you’re here, feel free. It hasn’t been used since we lost Lenny’s father.”

“Bones never rode it?”

She laughed, “I think he was too afraid to. Wouldn’t even get on with his daddy to ride around the driveway when he was younger.”

Jim hummed with a smirk… that could be fun.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Around one that afternoon Gran was just putting the last of the food she was preparing for the party in the fridge when the back door opened.

She turned to see Len walking in, bags in hand, and rounding the counter to place a kiss on her cheek, “It took a while, but I got everything on your list.”

“Thanks, Lenny,” she gave his arm a squeeze, “go ahead and drop those bags on the counter and head on out to the barn. Jimmy’s out there looking like a true Georgian.”

“Oh yeah?” Len raised a brow.

“Said he wanted to help out with some chores, so I gave him some of your old working clothes and sent him out,” and now to get rid of Len so she could finish up the preparations, “he’s been waiting on ya all day so you better hurry on up and get out there. And might I say, you’re boy sure does look mighty fine in overalls and cowboy boots.”

She threw him a wink and a smirk, watching his face go all shades of red before he laughed and said, “I’ll bet he does,” and practically ran out the door and to the barn.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Len wandered through the halls of the barn but could not find Jim anywhere. He finally found himself by the back of the barn near the tack room when he was jumped from behind. Jim had wrapped himself around Len like a koala, clinging to his back with his arms wrapped tightly around his shoulders.

“Happy birthday, old man!” Jim shouted and squeezed him tighter.

Len groaned, “Oh lord, I forgot about that. But thanks, kid.”

“Well, I would never forget your special day, and here’s your first present.”

“You didn’t have to get me anything, kid-”

Before he could finish he was cut off by Jim’s lips pressed into his cheek in a long kiss. He felt the heat instantly rise up his neck and hit his cheeks, and before he was ready for it to be over Jim had pulled away and was now standing in front of him, bright smile spread across his face.

“Well, if that’s what you got me, I’ll definitely accept more of those!”

Jim laughed, perhaps even blushing a little himself, “That’s not all I got you, but you’ll have to wait for the good stuff.”

“You mean it gets better then that?” he smirked touching his cheek gently.

“Sure does, Bones, and present number two…” he takes Len’s hand and starts pulling him through the barn, “I volunteered us for a bunch of chores today, Gran shouldn’t be doing them all herself after all.”

Len groaned at the thought of chores, especially on his birthday, but willingly followed after Jim anyways. He only needed to keep Len occupied for a few more hours before Jim could move him to the house just before the party.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Jim was quite proud of himself. He had managed to keep Len in the barn and away from the Gran for an entire four hours. Not only that but they had managed to get a tone of chores done for Gran. They mucked out all the stalls, cleaned some of the tack, tidied the indoor riding ring, and even managed to have enough time to help the barn hands with the evening feeding. Looking at the time and seeing that it was after five, Jim thought it was a good time to head for the house.

“Hey, Bones!” he called down the hall, and Len peeked his head out of one of the stalls, “Let’s head inside now. I’m sure Gran will have dinner ready soon and I am in desperate need of a shower.”

“Yeah, me too,” he agreed, and they made their way to the house together.

When they walked inside Gran was sitting at the kitchen table with a lady, who smiled at them as they walked inside.

“Boys,” Gran greeted them sipping at her tea, “Lenny, you remember Anita from down the street.” Len nodded and smiled at the lady, “Anita, this is Jim.”

“Howdy, ma’am,” Jim pretended to tip a hat, getting himself a chuckle out of Anita and an eye roll from Len.

“We’re gunna head up for showers, Gran,” Len said, taking Jim’s arm, “we’ll be down for dinner soon. Nice to see you again, Anita.”

“You too, Len,” she smiled.

“I’ll be up in a sec, Bones,” Jim took his arm from him, “you go first and I’ll shower after you, just gunna grab a water.”

Len nodded and quickly padded up the stairs. When Jim heard the bathroom door close he turned to Gran, “Do you need me to do anything?! When are the people coming?! Is there enough time?!”

Gran laughed, running a hand down his arm, “Don’t worry, Jimmy, everything’s going according to plan. While you boys were out in the barn I got all the food ready and the cake, it’s all in the fridge. And Anita’s going to help me set every thing up outside, along with some of the barn hands who offered to help. Everything will be set up and finished before you boys are ready.”

“Ok,” he sighed in relief, “I’ll make sure he waits for me upstairs before coming down, and I’ll turn the porch light on before I bring him outside.”

“Sounds like a plan, Jimmy my boy! Now head on up and shower, you smell like a zoo.”

He laughed and waved to Anita before heading upstairs after Len.

~~~~~~~~~~~

After Jim was finished in the shower and dressed in some decent clothes, he met Len in his room who was waiting for him while lounging on the bed.

“Ready for dinner, Bones? I know I’m starving after all that work.”

“I’m actually pretty comfortable right here,” Len said, shuffling back into the pillows more, “I forgot how tiring barn work is.”

“No kidding,” Jim did the last button on his shirt before walking to the edge of the bed, “I don’t know how you did that everyday when you were a kid.”

“Neither do I,” he turned his head to look at Jim and held out an arm, “you can join me for a few minutes before dinner, if you want.”

Jim didn’t hesitate in taking the offer and climbed in beside him, curling into his side and laying his head on his chest.

“This vacation was the best idea ever, Bones,” Jim mumbled lazily into Len’s chest.

Len sighed, “Yeah, too bad we have to back to classes and work after it.”

“It’ll be worth it in the end, when I have my own ship and you’re my chief medical officer.”

“Who says I want to be stuck on the same ship as you for god knows how long?”

Jim playfully smacked his stomach and laughed when his head bounced on Len’s chest with his laugh, “You wouldn’t want to be on anyone else’s ship, and you can’t even try to convince me other wise.”

Len shook his head and smiled, “Got that right, kid.”

They laid there for a little while longer in a comfortable silence until Jim felt the change in Len’s breathing and could tell he was falling asleep. He quickly got out of the bed, jostling Len awake, and took his hand, “Come on, I’m hungry and you need to eat before sleeping. Not to mention I don’t think Gran would appreciate it much if we slept through dinner after all the cooking she did.”

Without argument Len allowed Jim to guide him down the stairs and stopped in the doorway to the kitchen confused. The entire house was in darkness. He didn’t remember hearing Gran come up the stairs to head to her room down the hall, and surely she would have popped her head in to say good night like she always did.

“Where is she?” Len asked, clutching Jim’s hand a little tighter, worry taking over.

“I’m sure she’s fine, Bones,” Jim made his best attempt at feigning innocence as he brought Len over to the back door and turned on the porch light, “Maybe she’s sitting outside?”

They walked outside and Len looked around not seeing Gran, “She’s not out here… where the hell could she have possibly gone?”

“Maybe around the side of the house?”

Jim started dragging Len down the porch steps and this time he fought back a little, “Jim, I don’t think she would have gone all the way around there, especially not alone at night. She must be inside somewhere, or maybe we should call Anita-”

“Let’s just check, Bones,” he continued pulling Len around the house, despite him trying to hold back this time.

“Jim, honestly, she wouldn’t come all the way around-”

Len stopped in his tracks as they finally rounded the house. There were several large white tents popped up in the grass, one with tables and chairs and a buffet of food, and another with a small stage and a laid out dance floor. Both tents were connected and open, and lit up with beautifully coloured lights. A small band adorned the stage, and the tent was filled to the brim with people, neighbours and friends Len had grown up with, and at the front of the crowd was Gran with a huge smile on her face as Len stood there in awe.

A loud, “Surprise!” was shouted from the crowd and that’s what Len needed to break himself out of his trance and soak it all in. The smile on his face at the gesture was ear to ear as Gran walked over to kiss his cheek with a loud smack.

“Happy birthday, my sweet Lenny!” she kissed his cheek again before taking a step back as the band began to play behind her.

“You didn’t have to do all this for me, Gran.” He leaned in and kissed her back.

“Oh, it wasn’t just me,” she turned to Jim, “Jimmy had a hand in this too.”

He brushed her off with a wave of his hand, “Naw, I just kept you occupied while Gran organized everything.”

“Nonsense,” she gave his chest a pat, “I wouldn’t have been able to do it all in secret without you. Now, you boys go have some food and dance and have fun!”

Len took the hand he was still holding of Jim’s and walked him inside. They ate together and then Len took his hand once more and walked him around, introducing Jim to his childhood friends and neighbours. Jim didn’t miss a beat in any conversation and Len watched as Jim had all of them eating out of the palm of his hands. Everyone at the party loved Jim, and how could they not. He was funny and charming, and Len didn’t know how he had made it all those years before the academy, before he met Jim Kirk, the best thing that had ever happened to him.

After Jim had been introduced to nearly everyone, Len was being led by Jim to the front row of tables by the dance floor and told to sit. Len watched as he walked over to Gran, whispered in her ear, and then made his way back to sit with Len, quickly lacing their hands together on top of the table.

Before Len could ask what they were up to, the band stopped and Gran walked up onto the stage and took the mic. “Hello everyone, and thanks for coming to my grandsons birthday celebration,” everyone clapped before she continued, “Lenny, it means the world to me to be able to have you here again for your birthday. I know you’ve been working hard on your exams at the academy, and I am very proud of you, both of you, but it is so wonderful to finally have you home. I know life’s thrown some pretty heavy curve balls at you but you’ve over come every obstacle and, well, look at you now. You’ve got a great career ahead of you, wonderful friends and family around you to celebrate your birthday, and a gorgeous young man on your arm,” the two boys smiled, and Len removed his hand from Jim’s so he could wrap his arm around his shoulder and pull him closer, “you’ve made your old Gran very proud, Lenny, and Jimmy I would like to hereby officially welcome you to the family! I can’t wait to see what the future holds for you two boys! Happy birthday, Lenny.”

Cheers erupted through the tent and Gran left the stage open for anyone else who wanted to say a few words. Anita spoke next, recanting a few sweet memories of Len running around the neighbourhood scant only in a diaper, reeking havoc in the local shops, and never failing to make everyone in town smile and laugh. An old teacher of Len’s went next, remembering what a wonderful student Len was, one of his favourites he had said. A few other neighbours followed, everyone having only wonderful things to say about Len, and each one of them bringing up the fact that they were happy Len had finally found happiness in Jim, that Len’s “boyfriend” was a wonderful man, that Len was lucky to have him. And despite that fact that both boys were not in fact in a relationship, neither of them denied it, and honestly neither of them wanted to. Every time someone mentioned Jim in their speech it only made Len pull him closer, tucking Jim right into his side with Jim’s head on his shoulder and his hand resting on Len’s thigh. Until everyone had their say and it was Jim’s turn to take the stage.

He hopped up on stage and took the mic from the last person to speak, turning to face the crowd, looking at Len as he leaned across the table to listen to Jim. “Hello new family!” everyone answered in kind, “it makes me very happy to see that Bones has so many amazing people to share his life with here and who love him as much as you all do, because if anyone deserves all that, it’s definitely Bones.” He smiles directly at him, and his eyes never leave Len’s for the rest of his speech, “I remember the first day I met you on the shuttle in Riverside. I took one look at your drunk ass coming out of the shuttle bathroom, arguing with the attendant and yelling about infectious diseases and solar flares, and I thought, yep he’s the one. And I think you’ve definitely figured this out on your own already, but the “housing snafu” that landed you in a suite with me instead of your own bachelor suite… yeah, that was totally me. I hacked the system so we could room together.” Jim winked at Len and everyone chuckled, “After that you… you seemed to turn my world upside down, Bones. In a life as crazy as mine had been up until that point, no ones ever wormed their way into my heart as quickly as you did. Almost instantly I knew I would give you my life, my trust, and I had never given anyone that privilege before you. After just a short amount of time with you, the thought of being away from you scared the hell out of me, and… I know I said that you going to Georgia for two weeks and me staying at the academy would be a breeze but I totally lied. I was so relieved when Gran invited me to come with you, because I don’t think I would have made it two minutes, let alone two weeks without you, Bones. And I don’t know what our futures hold after graduation but I hope that fate lands us together. But I mean, if it doesn’t then that’s ok, cuz I’m sure I can find a way to hack that too,” everyone laughs again and Len continues watching him with tears in his eyes, “but no matter what happens I know you’ll be the amazing person you already are, and I’ll be standing right next to you the entire time, because I don’t want to be anywhere else. So, happy birthday, Bones.”

Everyone in the tent clapped and cheered for Jim’s speech, and Len found himself wiping away a few stray tears, and he definitely wasn’t the only one doing so. After a moment Jim waved at Len to join him on stage and said, “Ok, old man, time to blow out the candles!” and Len stood centre stage as a huge cake was brought up by two of their barn hands who had stayed to join the party.

While the tent erupted into a choir of happy birthday, Len turned and reached out to Jim. At first Jim tried to wave him off saying it was his day, but Len wouldn’t have it and took a step towards him, and Jim finally gave in and allowed Len to pull him into his arms. Len held Jim in front of him, head resting on Jim’s shoulder as his friends came to the end of the song, and with the last words he whispered into Jim’s ear, “together,” and after counting to three, the two of them blew out the candles together.

Everyone clapped and when Len let him go, Jim placed the mic in his hand and took a step back for him to speak. “Well, I must say this is a mighty fine surprise,” Len gestured to everyone gathered in front of him, “thank-you all for coming out and helping me celebrate my birthday, and thanks to Jim and Gran who put this whole thing together. I know it’s been a long time since I’ve been back to Georgia, back home, but I promise that I will make more time to visit after this. I hadn’t realized how much I really missed it here and everyone in it. I won’t make the mistake of staying away that long again. But, I’ll keep this short and sweet so we can all have some of Gran’s amazing cake,” a few hoots were heard from the back and Len laughed, “I honestly can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done for me, not just tonight but in all my years. After hearing some of those stories I realize now that when Gran said raising me took a village, she was not kidding. Now, everyone enjoy the rest of the night, eat more food, have some cake, and let’s get the band back up here so we can dance the night away!”

Len passed the mic off to someone as the band crowded the stage again, reaching for Jim’s hand and walking them off stage. As their feet hit the dance floor the band started up with a slow song and without Len even having to speak a word Jim was already in front of him, waiting for Len to take the lead like he had the night before. Len pulled him in with his hand on his back, taking his other hand in his and started gently swaying them to the music, pulling Jim as close to his body as he could get him.

As they danced, Jim rested his face in the crook of Len’s neck breathing in his scent as Len whispered to him, “Thank-you for this, Jim.”

“Don’t thank me, Bones, it was mostly Gran’s doing.”

Len chuckled, “I’m sure the two of you are of equal blame, but regardless, this means a lot to me and I’m really glad you’re here to spend it with me.”

Jim smiled into his neck, “I wouldn’t wanna be anywhere else.”

They continued to sway until the song was just about over when Jim lifted his head to look at Len with a smirk, “Do you think we could sneak away for a bit?”

Len looked around at their guests, then back to Jim, “I’m sure we could, everyone seems pretty occupied right now with cake and dancing. Everything ok?”

“Fine,” Jim stopped dancing and took Len’s hand, “I just wanted to give you your next present.”

Len perked up at that, giving Jim a smirk of his own, “Oh? In that case, follow me.”

After quickly making sure they weren’t being watched, Len guided Jim to the back corner of the tent by the stage, and the two of them parted the material and snuck out the back. Jim then took the lead and ran with Len across the grass and to the garage by the barn. Once inside Jim flicked on the lights and turned to Len.

“Ready for your present, Bones?”

Len nodded enthusiastically and closed his eyes, leaning his face towards Jim and offering his cheek. Jim chuckled and pushed Len away, Len laughing with him.

“Not that, Bones,” Jim turned and grabbed the cherry red tarp behind him and revealed the bike he had found earlier with Gran, “we’re going for a ride!”

Len eyed the bike behind him. He remembered it, it was his fathers old bike from when he was younger. “Oh no, kid. I’m not getting on that. I wouldn’t as a kid and I sure as hell don’t want to now.”

“Come on, Bones. It’s perfectly safe.”

“The hell it is! It’s a death trap.”

Jim couldn’t help but laugh, crossing his arms and giving Len a pointed look, “We are just a few years away from spending our lives in space, and you’re afraid of a motorcycle?”

Len didn’t quite know what to say to that because the kid did have a point… of course.

Jim shook his head in amusement and turned to the bike. When he turned back he had a helmet in his hand and took a step towards Len. He stepped away with his hands out but Jim persisted and got in his space.

“Remember when I said I trusted you, Bones, that I willingly gave you my life no matter what?” Len nodded, “I would never let anything happen to you, Bones.”

“I know you wouldn’t Jim.”

Jim shuffled the helmet between his hands before looking Len in the eyes, “Do you trust me?”

Len looked at the helmet and smiled, “Of course I do, Jim.”

Jim returned his smile and placed the helmet on Len’s head, helping him to fasten it. A few minutes later Jim was in front with Len behind him, clutching desperately to Jim as they slowly pulled out of the garage and down the long driveway. Little did they know Gran stood watching them from the porch with a smile as Jim turned out of the driveway and disappeared down the road.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Jim didn’t take them too far, knowing that Len was already sceptical about being on the bike in the first place. So he found a softly lit hiking trail a few minutes down the road and pulled into the small lot and parked the bike. Jim helped Len with his helmet again before taking his hand and leading him down the path. It was short, coming to a cliff at the end over looking a small city below, and the light from the almost full moon shone brightly over top of them.

Len lead Jim to the edge and they sat with their legs over the side for a while in a comfortable silence before Jim turned to face Len, Len following suit.

“So,” Jim began, fiddling with the small wrapped package in his jacket pocket, “I… I do have one last gift for you.”

Len smiled, shaking his head, “Kid, really, you didn’t have to get me anything at all. Everything you’ve already done has been more then enough.”

“But everything so far has been things you’ll just remember, where as this is something you can keep forever. Something you can see and touch everyday, or as long as you want it, that is.” Jim hesitates a moment before pulling the box out and handing it to Len, “I… I hope you like it.”

Len took the small package and slowly unwrapped it to reveal a small box. He popped the lid off and pulled out the item inside. A simple silver chain held a round medallion, also silver but with Starfleet’s medical insignia on the front. Len brought the medallion down to rest in the palm of his hand, running his thumb gently over the insignia. It was perfect.

“Jim I… this is-”

“Turn it over.”

Len did as he said and on the back he found two lines of engravings, both numbers. He suddenly found himself speechless, not to mention nearly breathless as his hands began to shake.

Jim shuffled forwards slightly, brushing their legs together before asking, “Do you know what they mean?”

Len let out a breathy chuckle, “How could I not?” he finally met eyes with Jim and the tears he had been trying to hold in since Jim’s speech at the party flowed freely now, “It’s the star date and coordinates of when we first met. Jim…”

Jim nodded and suddenly found himself shy, looking away from Len, “Do you like it? I know its not much but-”

Jim’s face was suddenly lifted to face Len, “It’s everything.” Jim reached a hand out to thumb away the tears streaming down Len’s face, “This is the best, most thoughtful gift anyone has ever given me. Jim… you don’t know how much this means to me.”

“Of course I do, Bones, because those engravings mean the same thing to me as I think they do to you.” Len tilted his head in question and waited for Jim to continue, “That stardate and those coordinates were a new beginning, the start of the most amazing years of my life so far. The day I met you everything changed. I was a wash out before then, but you… you make me want to be a better person, the best man I can be. If I hadn’t met you then, Bones, I don’t know where I would be right now. You changed my life, and I’ll never be able to thank you enough for that.”

Len didn’t even know what to say, because Jim had said it all and said it perfectly. Not to mention he was crying so hard that he didn’t think he’d be able to form coherent words even if he tried, so he did the next best thing. He removed his hand from Jim’s chin, running it down Jim’s neck and to the back of his head. He pulled him closer and pressed a long kiss to his cheek, then whispered a quick, “thank-you Jim,” before pulling Jim flush against him and burying his face in his neck. Jim did the same and the two of them held each other there for a long time, both occasionally peppering feather light kisses into the others skin.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Len rubbed his fingers over the medallion he was now holding. Since his birthday back in Georgia with Jim, he hadn’t taken it off, not for one second. He meant what he had said when he told Jim that this necklace was his everything. It held the exact time and location of his first meeting Jim, the exact moment his life turned around for the better, because Jim was his everything and always had been, right from that very first second in Riverside.

He let the necklace hang out over his shirt, moving his hand to run his fingers through Jim’s hair, bringing his forehead to rest on Jim’s as he whispered a promise, “Jim, when you wake up and we dock on Earth, I’m taking you back to Georgia for a two week vacation, just you and me. Maybe I’ll mandate that you need a month off duty and we’ll spend all of it in Georgia together, hell maybe we’ll just stay forever like you wanted to when we were… I should have just said yes back then, I should have just stayed with you in Georgia, then none of this would have happened. And when we do go back, when we go home Jim, I’m gunna take you back to that pond and I’m gunna love you, I’m gunna love you so hard Jim. I’m going I make sure you know how much you’ve always meant to me, how much I need you, how much I’ve always loved you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another long one for you guys… sorry! But I hope you enjoyed it! A little more fluff to come your way in the next few chapters before it gets worse… O-o
> 
> And I wanted to give a super special thanks to my girl Katie for helping me figure out the gift that Jim would be giving to Len! I wouldn’t have figured it out if it wasn’t for you XXX
> 
> Let me know what y’all think I love reading your comments <3


	9. Chapter 9

The rest of their trip to Georgia had gone so well. Jim and Len spent every waking moment together, and Gran couldn’t have been happier over the progress she was making with the two of them. If she had it her way they’d be making out behind the barn like a couple of horny teenagers before they left in three days.

The trip was slowly coming to an end, the boys only having a few days left of their two week vacation before heading back to the hustle and bustle of school life. And at the moment Gran was walking them across the yard and towards the paddocks to introduce Jim to the horses. 

By midday Jim had met mostly all of them and was now straddling the fence to pet a jet black mare who had come over to say hello.

“I think she likes you, Jimmy.” He smiled as he continued to run his hand down her nose as she nuzzled into him, “She's mine, her name’s Amara. I wish I could ride her again, but my old bones just can’t take it anymore, so unfortunately none of the horses really get a good riding these days.”

“That’s sad.”

“That it is, Jimmy my boy. The barn hands ride them occasionally, but those boys are tired after working all day,” she sighed, then perked up with a thought, “You boys have a few days left out here, why don’t you ride em’?” 

Jim turned to her with wide wild eyes and shouted, “Yes!” before jumping off the fence and running into the barn, Gran and Len following behind him.

When they were inside the barn, Jim nearly dancing through the lane, Gran pointed to two stalls side by side at the end, “That’s Lenny's horse, Titan, powerful thing he is. And that there’s Apollo, I think you'll like him, Jimmy.” Jim walked over to stand beside Gran and leaned into Apollo’s stall, “You boys know where the tack room is, I'm sure Lenny can help you find some boots and a helmet that’ll fit ya, and I’ll send one of the barn hands out before you leave with a picnic for you boys.” 

“You’re the absolute best, Gran!” Jim turned to smack her cheek with a quick kiss before opening the stall door and walking inside to properly meet Apollo. 

While Jim was distracted by the horse for the moment, Len took his chance to saddle up beside Gran and call her out. “Gran, we are supposed to be visiting you, not constantly running off and leaving you alone in the house. And don’t think for a second that I don’t know what you're up to with Jim.”

Gran threw him a sideways glance and a smirk as she replied sweetly, “Y’all have been in the house with me all mornin’, and look how excited Jimmy is to go for a ride. Take him out for a while and come back in a few hours, and don’t be afraid to use some of that McCoy charm I know you’ve got.”

Len sighed, looking to Jim then back to his Gran, “Jim and I… we… I don’t know if he-”

“Nonsense!” She gave his arm a smack, “If that boy didn’t have a lick of feelings for you he wouldn’t have followed you all the way out to Georgia! Now, use that brain in your thick skull and love that boy already. Y’all need to get over yourselves, before I'm dead.”

“Gran!” Len turned to her with a gasp and wide eyes at the mere thought.

“Lenny,” she took his hands in hers, “you deserve to be happy, and Jimmy makes you happy. I can see it, hell the whole town could see it at your party. And if there’s any clue as to how much that boy truly loves you it’s this right here.” she reached one hand up to loop a finger into the chain hanging around his neck, “He had this engraved with the very first moment you two met and gave it to you as a present on your birthday, you know why? Because this was the best moment of his life, the very moment he laid eyes on Leonard McCoy. This is no mere gift, my boy, this is very special to Jimmy and it’s special because of you.” 

Len looked down at the necklace hanging around his neck and smiled. “Now,” she gave his hand a pat and turned him towards Jim, “go on and help Jimmy tack up before he explodes from all the excitement.”

Len laughed as he looked over at Jim in the stall beside Apollo. Shifting from foot to foot, waiting as patiently as he could for them to finish their secret conversation. 

When Len walked over he took Jim's hand and lead him towards the tack room past Gran as she said, “I’ll send one of the barn hands out with the picnic before y’all leave, and I’ll have dinner ready by the time you get back. You boys have fun now.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

It took about a half an hour for them to tack the horses and find Jim boots and a helmet that fit, but they were finally about to head out for their ride. 

Len was on the bench in the tack room, finishing up with the zipper on his last boot, and when he stood and turned he was suddenly chest to chest with Jim and a cowboy hat was plopped onto his head. He laughed and lifted the hat with one finger to peer at Jim from under it. 

Jim stood before him, hands behind his back and face scrunched in thought. “You know,” he began in a husky tone, “I never really thought cowboys were sexy… apparently I was dead wrong.” Len gave him a smirk and Jim let out a small moan, causing Len's breath to hitch in his throat.

Without moving his eyes from Jim's he reached to the side and placed a hat on Jim's head too, leaning in to whisper, “Got that right, I'm currently staring at the sexiest one I know,” returning Jim's moan as he grabbed Len by the shirt and pulled him even closer.

Jim moved his hands up to snake his arms around Len's neck, “Maybe we shouldn’t go riding, Bones.”

Len let out a deep chested laugh, “I thought you were excited to ride the horses… what changed your mind?” and at the shiver that ran through Jim's entire body, he was sure he knew the answer.

Hands suddenly found their way into Len's hair, fingers winding themselves in to pull Len even closer then he already was as Jim practically moaned in his ear, “After seeing you in that hat I think I’d rather save a horse and ride a cowboy.”

The blush that ran up Len's neck and face was instant with Jim's words. God, how Len had wanted this for so long, but he and Jim had always joked, how was he to know if this was true? Yeah, they had gotten really close during their days here in Georgia, but what if he was reading this all wrong? What if Jim didn’t actually feel this way and it was all for a laugh? The last thing he wanted was to lose his friendship with Jim over a misunderstanding on his part. And as much as he wanted this, he didn’t want to push something that he wasn’t sure Jim wanted.

With those thoughts invading his mind Len moved his hands from Jim's back and placed them on his hips, pushing back just a bit to separate them, “Alright, come on, before it gets too dark and I have to hear you whine about not being able to ride.”

Len moved past Jim and walked out towards their waiting horses, and Jim was left standing in the tack room breathless and flushed, wondering what the hell just happened. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

“Left foot in the stirrup and kick off hard.” Jim did as instructed and with a little help from Len managed to land himself somewhat gracefully in the saddle. “Good job!”

Jim watched as Len rounded his horse beside him and launched himself into the saddle like he belonged there, then he turned to Jim. “Apollo's pretty laid back so he’ll just follow Titan, you won’t have to do much or worry he's gunna take off.”

Jim just nodded and Len urged his horse forwards, Jim’s following after. 

After an oddly long silence between them, Len turned to speak, “Awfully quite, Jim, that’s not like you. Do I need to break out the medkit?”

Jim jerked, ripping himself from his thoughts. He had thought that Len wanted the same thing as him, especially after the way they had been with each other since landing in Georgia. He thought that Len was giving him hints and signals, but maybe he was wrong. Maybe Len just thought this was a game between them, a joke among… friends. But he didn’t want it that way, he wanted more. Maybe he wasn’t doing enough, maybe Len thought the same way as him, that Jim was the one who wanted to be just friends. Maybe he had to do more to show Len that certainly was not the case, and he’d be damned if he didn’t do just that!

He turned to face Len, forcing a smile on his face and replied, “M’fine, Bones, promise.”

He gave Jim a skeptical look, but decided to drop it for now and focused on their path ahead. After riding through the forest for a while Len finally dismounted then walked around to help Jim get down from Apollo, he tied their horses to a nearby tree. He grabbed the basket of food Gran had prepared them and led Jim a little deeper into the forest.

As Jim followed behind, batting away some pretty thick brush he shouted ahead, “Where are we going, Bones?”

“Just a little further,” he called back, before he disappeared from Jim's sight.

“Bones?!” 

Jim pushed harder and faster trying to catch up to Len, and when he pushed through the brush where Len had disappeared he found himself in a small circular clearing in the trees. Len was already sitting on the spread out blanket and pulling out the containers of food.

“You sitting or what?” Jim blinked down at Len and then finally joined him, taking no time at all to start digging into the fruit and pastries packed by Gran.

Len smiled at Jim as he stuffed his face, hoping that this meant he was over whatever had hit him at the beginning of their ride, and followed suit with some strawberries.

“So,” Jim began around a mouthful, “how did you find this?”

“With my Ma,” Jim stopped eating and focused his eyes on Len, “we used to ride a lot when I was younger. We would come out here and have picnics all the time together, just the two of us while my Pa was at work. We found this little clearing by accident one day, stumbled onto it while we were playing hide and seek to give the horses a break, and after that we came here almost everyday.”

“That’s a nice memory, Bones.”

“It is,” he nodded, “and when she died this sort of became my safe haven. I’d come out here on my own despite Gran yelling at me to stop running off. But it was the only place after her death that I felt really close to her.”

“I'm sorry,” Jim reached over and placed a hand on Len's knee, “we don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

Len covered Jim's hand with his own looking down, “I just wish they hadn’t died that night, I wish that man hadn’t been drinking and driving and hit my parents car.”

“I wish that too,” Jim whispered, “but at least you had Gran.”

“Yeah,” Len smiled finally locking eyes with Jim, “still do. I don’t know what I would do without her.”

Now that Len was smiling again Jim gave his hand a squeeze and then returned to picking at the food. “She’s a great lady, you're lucky to have her as a Gran. I wish I would have met her sooner.”

“I should have brought you out here a long time ago,” Len nodded as he popped in another strawberry, “I knew you would love it here, I knew you’d love Gran, and I shouldn’t have stayed away for so long.”

“Well, I'm glad were here now, and,” Jim raised his watermelon in a toast and Len touched his strawberry to it as Jim continued, “I can’t wait to come back after next semester exams!”

~~~~~~~~~~~

Two days later and their trip had finally come to an end. It was their last day in Georgia and the two had spent it making sure that Gran had everything she needed before they left early the next morning. They made a trip into town to stock Gran's kitchen, helped her with a few last minute chores around the house, took her out for a nice dinner at the fanciest restaurant in town, and now they were spending their last night of freedom relaxing.

Jim had popped on an old movie, some sappy romance that Len had tried to talk him out of in place of one about cars, but Jim had insisted and put it on. They were about halfway through the movie, Len was sitting on the couch and Jim was lying on the floor below him using Len's feet as a pillow, when Gran stood up from her chair beside them.

She gave an over exaggerated yawn before turning to them, “I think I'm going to turn in early tonight boys.”

Both boys immediately snapped their heads towards her, movie forgotten, “Are you alright, Gran? You don’t normally turn in this early.”

“I'm fine, Lenny,” she insisted with a wave of her hand, “but you boys are leaving early tomorrow and I want to be up to see you off.”

Len didn’t look at all convinced so Jim stepped in, “You sure Gran? You know if you need anything you can tell us, right?”

She smiled and pat the top of Jim's head, “Of course I do. But nothing to worry about, my boys, just a tired old lady. Good night you two.”

The boys responded in kind and slowly turned their attention back to the movie as Gran made her way towards the stairs. When she reached the bottom step she turned back to them with a smirk on her face the devil would be proud of, and innocently suggested, “You know, it’s a fine night out boys. Why not go out for your last night and enjoy the Georgia night? Stars are out tonight and it’s a full moon.”

Len's head turned to her so quickly he was sure he had whip lash. She was never sick or even tired, this was all a ploy!

Before he could say anything Jim sat up from his place at Len's feet, “That actually sounds really nice, Bones, and we don’t get many opportunities like that back at the academy.”

When he finished, Jim turned slightly and laid his chin on Len's knees as he hugged his legs, giving Len his best puppy dog eyes. And of course it worked, “Where do you wanna go, kid?”

“I dunno,” Jim laughed as Len bounced his feet jostling Jim around as he did, “you’ve lived here most of your life, you tell me. Where's the best place to go on a nice night under a full moon?”

Gran saw her chance there and snuck back into the living room to plant one more idea. “Lenny, why not take Jimmy back to the pond?” he looked back to Gran completely shocked. His mouth opened and closed a few times but nothing came out. This had to be her best scheme yet during their visit, she certainly had a way with meddling and there was no doubt in his mind exactly where her thoughts were headed. “It’s a nice quite place to talk, no one else around for miles… you can be as loud as you want.”

When she finished she sent a wink Len's way and his jaw instantly hit the floor. His sweet little innocent Gran… apparently not.

Jim was up and moving in an instant, thankfully not catching the silent exchange between Len and Gran and shouting, “That sound great! Let’s go, Bones!”

And before Len could manage to get words out of his mouth Jim was bouncing up the stairs beside Gran to grab his shoes. In a flash Jim was running back down the stairs, Len's shoes being thrown at him as Jim turned into the kitchen yelling at him to hurry up, before running out the back door. All Len could think as he quickly pulled on his shoes was curse Gran and her meddlesome ways… but hopefully also thank her too.

It wasn’t long before Len was strolling out the back door and down the porch steps, but Jim was already halfway across the yard. He couldn’t help but laugh as he called out, “Kid, wait for me! You don’t even know where the pond is.”

“Hurry it up then, old man!” Jim turned back and waved him forwards, “I wanna get there before we have to leave tomorrow.”

Len just shook his head with a smile on his face and ran to catch up to Jim, swooping down to take his hand and lead him the rest of the way.

After they crossed the yard, past all the paddocks, and walked for a few minutes through the trees they finally came to the pond. It was beautiful. The small clearing held a shimmering pool of water under the glow of the silver moon directly overhead, surrounded completely by trees and brush, a perfect little hidden paradise. At the sight of it Jim wished they never had to leave. 

Len let Jim's hand go and walked to the edge of the pond. He toed off his shoes and sat at the edge with his legs in the water, and Jim sat beside him doing the same.

A comfortable silence washed over them as Jim laid his head on Len's shoulder, and they stayed like that for a long time before Jim asked, “How deep is it?”

“Mid torso,” he sighed, completely comfortable like this, “used to swim here with Gran as a kid.”

Jim nodded, then stood jostling Len out of his dazed state. When Len turned his head around Jim was stripping down to his boxers.

“What are you doing?” he quirked a brow.

Jim shrugged as he tossed his shorts to the side, “It’s a nice night, Bones, lets swim.”

“No thanks!” he shook his head, turning back to the pond. 

“Oh, come on,” Jim gave him a nudge, “just jump in with me.” Len just shook his head refusing to look back at Jim, “It’s just the two of us out here, and I’ve seen you in your boxers before if that’s what you're worried about. Or are you just chicken… old man.”

Jim knew he had him and smirked as, sure enough, Len stood and turned to stalk towards Jim. He stood right in front of Jim and looked him dead in the eyes, his gaze so intense that Jim found himself unable to look away. With a smirk, Len ran his finger tips ever so lightly from Jim's hips and up his bare sides, loving the shivers he felt rippling through Jim's body. Jim's head tilted back slightly as he let out a gasp, and Len's hands moved back down to flatten on Jim's hips. He moved one hand around to the small of Jim's back to pull him in closer, flush against his chest, and in one swift move tightened his hold on Jim and jumped sideways into the pond. 

When Jim popped his head out of the water, sputtering and confused with Len laughing in front of him, he couldn’t help but join in. when he finally caught his breath he swam closer to Len and stood before him, almost touching but not quite. Without moving his eyes from Len's he reached down and grabbed the bottom of Len's shirt, pulling it slowly over his head and throwing it on the grass. He then ran his hands down Len's shoulders, then his chest and towards the button of his shorts, making quick work of that and leaning down to pull them off. He tossed them in the same direction as the shirt and the two were now both in only boxers. 

Slowly they closed the gap between them, Jim landing his hands on Len's chest and Len wrapping his arms around Jim's waist and keeping him close. The silver glow of the full moon above them caught on the medallion wrapped around Len's neck and Jim ran a hand down the chain. It definitely hadn’t gone unnoticed by Jim that Len had so far kept his word and had yet to take it off, which Jim could not describe in words how that made him feel, so he did the next best thing. He leaned down, Len's eyes caught on his every move, and placed an open mouthed kiss on the medallion on Len's chest, catching half medallion and half skin between his lips. He felt and heard the moan ripple through Len's chest and smiled as he nosed the spot, then brought his head up to lie on Len's shoulder. 

Jim moved his hands up and around Len's neck to play with his hair between his fingers as Len gently swayed them back and forth. “You know, I’ve never brought anyone to the pond before, you're the only one.” Jim smiled into his shoulder, blushing profusely. “And thanks for coming with me, Jim, it means a lot to me that you're here,” he whispered into Jim's shoulder.

Jim ran a hand down the back of Len's head and replied, “Any time, Bones, I loved this.”

“Me too,” he smiled, “it made Gran really happy to have you here, she really likes you, Jim. And it was nice to see her reaction when you accepted the invitation to come out.”

“I would do anything fro Gran,” he hesitated a moment, then continued, “but you know I also came for you, right?”

“Me?”

“Yeah,” Jim breathed, “I meant what I said at your party. Two weeks without you, alone in our room… I wouldn’t have made it.”

Len chuckled, “I'm sure you would have been fine, and you know there are other people on campus besides me. You have other friends, Jim, two weeks would have seemed like a breeze.”

Jim smiled as he rubbed his thumb melodically over Len's hair line at the base of his neck. Len was right, he had plenty of other friends, but he was wrong in thinking Jim wouldn’t have been bothered with his absence. 

He ran his thumb over the same spot once more then whispered almost inaudibly, “I only want you, Bones.”

Len didn’t know what to say, so he just wrapped his arms tighter around Jim and nuzzled his face into the crook of his neck.

“We should just stay here.”

The suggestion was so out of place that it took Len a second to register what he had said. “What?”

“Here, in Georgia,” Jim shrugged as if it was obvious, “we should just stay here forever.”

“And give up Starfleet?” He raised a brow even knowing Jim couldn’t see it.

“It’s beautiful here, peaceful.” He sighed against Len's shoulder, “I’ve never felt as content in my life as I do right here, with you.”

“That’s why I love it here so much,” and it was true, he always did love Georgia.

“It’s settled then, we’ll stay.”

Len laughed and Jim was quick to follow. 

“Can’t be captain if you're grounded in Georgia,” Len joked, but at the same time both boys knew it was true.

“Yes…” he drawled, “but we’d be grounded together. You and me, Bones, forever.”

Len couldn’t help but find himself a little shocked. He knew Jim was stuck to his hip like glue, but he hadn’t realized just how deeply attached he was, maybe he wasn’t reading the signs wrong after all. “So you’d give up all that, space, discovery, exploration, just to stay here with me in Georgia?”

“If you asked me to.” Just as simple as that it seemed.

“And what if I didn’t want to stay here?” he asked, testing the waters slightly, “What if I asked you to run away? Live on another planet far from here and never see Georgia again.”

Jim continued to rub his thumb over Len's neck as he answered, “I go where you go, Bones.”

Len let out a chuckle at that, but still replied with, “Yeah, same here, kid.”

Both of them held tighter to each other, neither wanting to let this moment go, but they knew it couldn’t last forever. “As much as I would love to stay here with you, Jim, we have to go back.”

Jim sighed, it was a nice dream but even he knew it couldn’t be, “I know, kinda don’t want to though.”

“Me neither kid. But…”

“But what?”

“Maybe one day we can,” Len stopped his swaying momentarily, just holding Jim still in the pond, “stay here together that is, if you still want to by then-”

“Yes!” 

Len laughed, “What if you change your mind about me? A few years down the road you might not want a grumpy old doctor anymore.”

“Never, Bones,” Jim shook his head, “you and me to the end, no matter what.”

It wasn’t Len's fault if a tear suddenly escaped him, running down his cheek and landing on Jim's shoulder just then. “No matter what, kid.”

Neither said another word after that, instead picking up their swaying again and spending most of the night wrapped in each others arms under the moon and stars.

~~~~~~~~~~~

With the medallion between his fingers Len looked down at Jim's still motionless body in the biobed. Those two weeks in Georgia were the best two weeks of his life. He had Jim all to himself, no exams, or classes, or work. Just the two of them in a perfect paradise of their own, one he wishes could have lasted forever. 

“I never got to tell you on that trip what I really wanted to tell you,” he began, taking up Jim's hand in his and running his thumb over his fingers, “I should have, but I didn’t. I was worried I was reading it all wrong. One minute you were all over me, right by my side, holding my hand, and all I had to do was just lean in and say it, but… but I was never sure if it was right, if you would say it back, and I didn’t want to lose you because I was wrong. It’s obvious now, looking back, that we were both just dancing around each other like fools. Gran was right, I should have just told you.”

He sighed, wishing with all his might that the hand in his would squeeze back, or Jim would open his eyes and look at him, just finally hear him. But he was becoming more and more worried that it wouldn’t happen and he had lost his chance, hundreds of chances actually. 

“God,” he ran his free hand down his face, “you don’t know how much I need you Jim. I was a god damn mess without you. You said two weeks away would have been bad? How about two months?! I’ve been an absolute wreck without you, kid, and it’s about high time you wake up. I need you by my side, I need your hand in mine when you think no ones looking, hell I don’t even care if you wanna hold my damn hand on the bridge where everyone can see. I don’t even care if you never let go again, I just need you to wake up Jim-”

A tear fell from his cheek and landed on Jim's. He had gotten so close, their foreheads were almost touching and he had at some pointed started crying. His chest was aching and breathing was becoming very difficult with every second that Jim remained unresponsive. He closed the gap and rested his forehead on Jim's, taking in a deep breath before speaking again, “I’ve always needed you Jim, always. Right from the first moment I met you, and you managed to keep me calm the whole way from Riverside to the academy, but when… when everything fell apart and you were still there beside me it only made my love for you stronger, I'm just sorry it took me all these years to finally get the courage to say it. But god I need you, I need you now more then I ever have in my life, even back then… I can’t live without you, Jim.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THE POND SCENE!!!!!! Finally! I feel like I’ve been waiting a hundred years to give this to you guys and it hath finally arrived! I hope y’all like it as much as I do, buuuuuuuut….. Fair warning, this is the last little bit of nice soft mckirk you’ll see for a while, the next chapter gets a bit heavy…
> 
> Hope everyone enjoys this and let me know what you think <3
> 
> And if you wanted to check out my tumblr you can find me at jiminthestreets-bonesinthesheets dont be afraid to chat me up!
> 
> <3<3<3


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo, yeah… no more nice easy going times for our boys in this chapter. Fair warning, i totally cried while writing this chapter…. good luck friends.

Over the last few weeks Jim had found himself happier then he could ever remember being. He was still on a high from his time in Georgia with Len, and since returning to the academy the two of them had never been closer. 

His last class of the day had ended and he was racing to get home, home to Bones. He was practically running through the campus, excitement coursing through his body and urging him forwards because tonight he didn’t have to work, and neither did Len. It was rare when the two of them actually synced up with their schedules and both had time off together, but when they did they always made sure to make the most of it, even before Georgia. Jim knew this meant pizza ordered in, beer, and a movie night in their pj’s. This was the usual routine for their nights off together, but since coming back from vacation they had started to add cuddling on the couch to their movie nights in. 

It would always go the same way. Pizza would be devoured and at least two beers each by the time the first half hour of the movie had passed, and right around the middle of the movie would hit, Len would reach out his arm for Jim to snuggle right up into his side. And sometimes, if Jim was brave enough, he would be able to get Len to lay on his back so Jim could sneak between his legs and lay on his chest with his head tucked under Len's chin. Movie night with Len was always Jim's favourite time, but with the recent cuddling addition it was more then he could express in words.

Finally having made it across campus and into their building, he skipped waiting for the elevator and ran straight up the stairs three at a time. he was so excited he nearly took the door off its hinges when he burst inside, a smile wide on his face as he shouted out, “Bonesy, I'm home!” through their small academy suite.

He toed off his shoes and dumped his bag at the door, looking around the living room and kitchen when he didn’t get an answer. He walked through the dorm looking from one side to the other but it seemed empty, though he knew Len was supposed to be home. He had no more classes for the week and was off for the next two days from the academy medbay. Jim had been looking forward to this night for two weeks since they got their work schedules. 

With only one other place he could be he headed towards their bedroom. He was just about to open the door when he heard shuffling followed by a loud crash on the other side and hurried in. 

“Bones?!” Len was practically running around the room, opening closets and dresser drawers, shoving piles of clothes into the duffel bags on his bed, completely tearing the place apart as Jim looked on in horror. “Bones, what the hell’s going on?!”

When Len didn’t stop moving Jim jumped the bed between them and grabbed his shoulders before he could turn away again. When Jim took his face in his hands and brought it up to his he could see Len was crying. Tears still welling in his eyes and falling down his already stained cheeks. Jim's heart sunk into his stomach at the sight. 

“Bones, tell me what's wrong.” He tried to keep his voice steady.

“It’s… it’s Gran, Jim,” he sucked in a shaking breath, “I got a call from a nurse at the hospital in Georgia. She was taken in an hour ago and they don’t think she's-”

Len couldn’t finish his sentence but Jim knew what he meant. He pulled Len in and let him cry into his shoulder while he clutched the back of Jim’s shirt, and Jim ran his fingers through Len's hair at the nape of his neck, “We were just there, Bones, not three weeks ago. What happened?”

He shook his head against Jim's neck, “I don’t know. The nurse said a friend who checks on her every morning stopped by and found her passed out in the living room. No one knows why yet, they were still doing tests and scans.”

Jim nodded and after a minute lightly pushed Len back, “We gotta go then.”

“You’ll come with me?”

Jim took his face again and used his thumbs to wipe away the falling tears, bringing their foreheads together and whispered, “Of course, Bones.”

“Good,” he reached around Jim to grab the two duffels on his bed, handing one to him, “cuz I already packed your bag.”

Jim turned away for a moment, crossing to his side of the room to grab his passport and jacket from the dresser beside his bed. He threw the duffle over his shoulder and took Len's arm guiding him towards the door, “I’ll call the shuttle port and get us some tickets on the way there.”

“Thanks, Jim.”

Hand in hand the two ran through the campus towards the bus terminals, both of them sending silent prayers to Gran.

~~~~~~~~~~~

When the shuttle arrived in Georgia they went straight to the hospital, not even bothering to stop by the house first. The grabbed a ride to the hospital from the port and where there in less then ten minutes. They didn’t even bother to wait for the elevators and ran up the stairs four at a time until they reached the third floor. 

Neither one of them stopped at the information desk, and neither one of them stopped when a nurse spotted them and came running out of the nurse’s station in the intensive care unit. 

“Mr. McCoy!” she shouted as she ran after them, no one stopping as Len searched every room for his Gran, “Leonard, wait!”

Finally he came to a room with the name plate “McCoy” and was about to enter when a doctor came walking out and stopped right in front of him, Jim behind him, and the nurse behind Jim.

“Doctor Hannover, how's my Gran?!” 

The doctor looked from Len to the nurse behind them and she softly shook her head. The doctor sighed, turning his gaze back to Len, a sympathetic look that Jim understood right away. 

“Leonard,” Doctor Hannover began and Jim reached forwards to grab Len's arm as he continued, “your grandmother suffered another stroke, this time it was unfortunately too much for her body to handle. We tried our best, Leonard, I'm sorry for your loss.”

Len's entire world seemed to go cold, white… weightless. He could feel Jim's hand on his arm, he could hear his Gran’s nurse, Karen, speaking in the background, but he couldn’t make out what she was saying. Doctor Hannover was trying to pull him back to reality, Jim was running his other hand across his back, and Karen was trying to pass out tissues, and it was far too much for Leonard to handle. Without a second thought to anyone else, he dropped his bag at his feet, turned, and ran out of the ICU. 

Jim turned with him and watched him go out a side door and to a rooftop garden, disappearing into the tall bushes. “I’ll go after him,” Karen began in a soft voice, but Jim cut her off. Dropping his bag beside Len's in the hall and sprinting after Leonard. 

He ran out the same door and followed the path he had seen Len take, eventually finding him sitting on the ground, curled in on himself with his hands in his hair. He slowly walked to stand behind him whispering, “Bones,” and gaining no response. Jim knelt down and tucked his hands under Len's arms and lifted him from the ground. His eyes were red and full of tears again, and as soon as he turned and saw Jim's face he launched himself into Jim's arms and sobbed. 

The two of them stood on the roof together, neither of them knew for how long, and cried before eventually Jim pulled back just enough to see Len's face and touch their foreheads together to whisper, “You’ve gotta go back inside, Bones, you need to say goodbye.”

He shook his head against Jim's, “I can’t, Jim.”

“You have to.”

He shook his head again, trying to desperately pull Jim even closer to himself. “I can’t… I can’t say goodbye.”

“I’ll be right there with you, Bones,” Jim whispered, “but you have to. For Gran, you’ve got to say goodbye.”

“Your boyfriends right, Leonard,” Karen’s soft voice came from behind them, “you need the closure.”

Len closed his eyes against Jim's cheek as Jim rocked them back and forth, “I'm right here, Bones.”

A few seconds passed and Len finally nodded, and without even thinking about it ran his hand down Jim's arm and entwined their fingers together as they walked back into the hospital. 

Slowly they walked into Gran’s room and Jim took it at Leonard's pace, never letting go of his hand. When Len saw his Gran lying in the bed, lifeless and unmoving, it instilled a feeling in him he had never before experienced. His entire body went almost numb, he found it hard to move, to breathe, but eventually found himself at the side of her bed. Len was a doctor, and he had lost patients before and seen his fair share of death, but when it was your own family, someone you loved deeply, it was something else entirely. 

All he could do was stand there and stare at her, he didn’t know what else to do. It was Jim who made the first move, still holding Len's hand he stepped around him and placed his free hand over Gran’s on the bed. He leaned in and placed a soft kiss to her forehead and whispered, “Bye, Gran, we’ll miss you,” and stepped back for Len. 

He shuffled forwards and sat on the edge of the bed, he took her hand in his as Jim had, and ran his thumb over her fingers. He took his time while he sat beside her, all the while thinking about how much he would miss her, and how his life would never be the same without her. And when he felt he was ready he leaned down to whisper his good byes, “I love you, Gran, thank you for everything,” he whispered against her cheek before he stood and left the room hand in hand with Jim. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

They arrived at the house around nine that night after finishing at the hospital. It was quiet and empty, and neither of them could bring themselves to speak a word as they walked through the halls. They made their way upstairs, and for the first time since the hospital, they let go of each others hands to enter separate bed rooms. Len was exhausted and so was Jim, both resigning to go straight to bed, though neither one slept at all that night.

The next morning Jim was out of bed first. He watched as the sun rose, casting shadows over the foot of his bed and eventually shining straight through the window lighting the entire room. He hadn’t heard Len come out of his room yet, so he threw on some tracks and a loose t-shirt and walked across the hall. As he suspected Len was still in bed, eyes just as tired and red as Jim's felt. 

Jim stood beside his bed holding his hand out to Len, “Come on, Bones, we’ve got to get up. You need food and we need to get ready for the funeral this afternoon.”

“She just died, Jim, yesterday,” he sighed, rubbing his tired eyes, “can’t we just take a minute and slow down.”

He sat on the edge of the bed and wiggled his way over to rub against Len's side, “I know its fast but its better this way. She’ll be laid to rest beside your mom and dad, and the rest of your family, and she’ll be at peace.”

He knew Jim was right but that didn’t make him feel any better. 

When Len didn’t say anything in response Jim stood, holding his hand out to Len again who took it this time, and let Jim lift him out of the bed. Jim went to Len's duffel and threw him some tracks and a shirt and waited for him to change. When he was finished, Jim once again held his hand out to Len, and once Len's hand was in Jim's it never left for more then a few moments before they were entwined again. Jim was by Len's side the entire time, the two never wanting to be without the other, and Jim wanting to make sure that Len had the complete support and love he needed in this time. Even if that meant just being there and holding his hand, Jim was going to do it. 

They walked down the stairs and into the kitchen and it was like walking through a fog. Three weeks ago during their time spent visiting Gran they had woke every morning to the smell of food cooking, smooth crooning music paying as Gran waltzed herself around the kitchen. The whole place was bright and so full of life, but with her absence it felt almost chilling and dull. Like a scene from an old black and white movie.

They grabbed a quick bowl of cereal each, Len playing idly with Jim's fingers in his on the table, and ate in silence. They abandoned their dishes in the sink and made their way back up stairs to get ready, both donning their academy dress uniforms, and before they knew it found themselves heading for the funeral home in town. The day seemed to be moving all too fast for Len, but he was thankful that no matter what he had Jim there to ground him, to hold him in place with a slight squeeze of his hand when he needed it, and that included the time they spent greeting everyone who came to Gran’s funeral.

Len and Jim both stood by the door to the small chapel in the funeral home, greeting everyone that came inside to pay their respects, and thanking them for doing so. Len had to admit that it was exhausting. Having to listen to everyone recite wonderful memories of times with his Gran, accept hugs and kisses, and try not to burst into tears every time someone uttered the words “I'm sorry for your loss”. He knew they were all sincere, he just hated that it had to be true, he hated that he had to lose his Gran all too soon.

As the minister was getting ready and everyone was slowly finding seats, he turned to Jim. Not a word needed to be said between them for Jim to understand what he needed, and he squeezed Len's hand that still remained clutched tightly in his and Jim touched his forehead to Len's, the two closing their eyes to take a silent moment between them. 

They were about to walk in and join everyone inside when a hand came to rest gently on Len's shoulder, turning he found a familiar face, “Karen.”

“Oh, Leonard, I'm so sorry for your loss,” she pulled him in for a quick hug before pulling back to look at him, “your grandmother was a sweet lady and everyone at the hospital loved her.”

“Thanks, Karen, I really appreciate you being here, and I'm sure she would too,” Karen nodded as her eyes skirted over to Jim, then down to their clasped hands, “Karen, this is Jim, you guys didn’t get to properly meet yesterday.”

She gave Len a nod as she pursed her lips, then turned to Jim with an outstretched hand and a soft smile, “Hello, Jim.”

“Hello,” he shook her hand, “and thank you for coming.”

“You don’t happen to be Jim Kirk?” she raised a brow at Jim then smiled when he nodded, a bit confused, “I remember your name from Len's grandmothers stories. When Leonard left for school there was suddenly a Jim Kirk in every story she would tell us during her appointments. She would tell us how you two were doing in school, the funny things Leonard would tell her about you, things you two did together, how good she knew you were for each other. It got to the point where we would all anticipate her appointments so we could get an update on you two, and I think she loved bragging about you both. And when she finally got to meet you face to face when you visited last month, she was over the moon about it.”

Jim smiled and could feel a slight blush creeping up his neck, “It’s an honour to have been a part of her life. I only wish I had gotten to know more of her.”

“I wish you had too, Jim,” then she looked between the boys again as the minister called for everyone to take their seats, “she loved you both very much, and I know she was very appreciative of you Jim for all that you do for Leonard. You're such a wonderful boyfriend to our sweet Leonard. I'm very glad he has you.”

They watched her walk inside and take a seat. Neither of them denying her words and instead only shifting closer to one another as they walked inside and to the front row. 

As they sat, Jim held Len's hand, and when the minister called Len up to the front to give the eulogy for his Gran, Jim tried to let him go but was only pulled along with him. Jim stood beside him, still hand in hand while he gave his speech, even helping Len to finish it as the words on the pages became too blurry to read, and he had to turn himself into Jim's body seeking his comfort. 

Jim held his hand as they sat in the small cemetery and watched as his Gran was lowered into the ground, and held his hand as they walked to the grave, each taking a small handful of dirt and placing it inside. He held Len's hand as they watched the grave be filled in, as the friends of Len's Gran slowly started leaving the cemetery one by one, leaving them there alone. And Jim held his hand while they stood over the freshly turned ground where his Gran now lays with the rest of his family, and when Len said he was ready to leave, Jim held his hand the whole way home. 

When they arrived back at the house, they both walked silently up the stairs, finally breaking apart to head into their separate rooms to get ready for bed. When both of them had changed into just track pants, they came to their doors to say good night to the other, but found themselves just standing there staring at each other, neither exactly knowing what to say or do after the days events.

It was Len who made the first move, holding his hand out across the hall, once again seeking Jim's. He took Len's hand without a word and allowed Len to guide him into his room and into his bed. Once the two were under the covers, Len gave Jim's hand a tug pulling him the small distance Jim had left between them. Jim moved closer and held his arms out inviting Len in, and he took the offer without hesitation, craving Jim's warmth and touch. He laid his head on Jim's chest as Jim wrapped his arms tightly around him, and tangled their legs together as Len clutched tightly to Jim's body. 

That night Len stayed tucked into Jim and cried all the tears he wanted to cry, and Jim held him close, running gentle fingers through his hair and occasionally placing soft kisses on top of his head, staying awake until Len finally fell asleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning Len decided he couldn’t stay there much longer, he wanted to go back to the academy, back to his home with Jim. The memory of his Gran still so fresh it was too much for him to bear at the moment. Jim nodded and left the room to make arrangements for them to head back, and Len slowly dragged himself out of bed to pack the few things they had scattered around the room. 

When he finished he took both bags down stairs to the living room, leaving Jim to continue making their arrangements over his comm in the kitchen. He placed the bags on the couch and startled when a small thud sounded behind him. Confused, he crossed the living room to the pictures that were on the mantle above the fireplace. He looked at them all, remembering all the good times he had with his Gran in this house. Fishing in the creek out back, dancing on the deck, picnics in the apple orchard, riding on a lazy Sunday together through the fields, but one picture had suddenly fallen forwards and was now face down on the mantle. He picked it up and smiled when he saw what it was. It was taken during their visit last month with Gran, when they were outside at the fire lying together in the grass. Gran must have taken the picture of the two of them laughing together, looking completely content and as happy as he had ever been. It was as if Gran was still trying to meddle, still trying to tell him things even thought she was gone now.

As he thought back on the memory, Jim called for him from the kitchen to let him know that they had tickets and a car would be arriving in five minutes to take them to the shuttle port. So he walked back to their bags on the couch, the picture still in his hands, and placed it in his bag before grabbing them and heading out the front door with Jim.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Len looked to Jim's still resting face, eyes still closed, hand still loose in his. When Len lost his Gran, the only family he had left, he knew he wasn’t alone. He had Jim. Jim, who was right beside him the whole time, through her death, the funeral, the burial, and even after. 

Jim, who held him almost every night after they left Georgia for good. The week following her funeral was rough, and Jim would crawl into Len's bed every night and let him cry into his chest until he fell asleep. Even after the tears stopped at night, Jim would still crawl in beside Len, and after a while Jim stopped using his bed all together and would immediately get in beside Len every night. Len would even find him there when he would come home after a late shift in the medbay. 

Sharing a bed had stopped when they boarded the Enterprise since they had separate quarters, and Len would be the first to admit that since they separated sleeping had become a thing of the past. He missed Jim's warm solid body beside him at night, he missed waking up with Jim's head tucked under his chin, their arms and legs wrapped around each other. 

“You know, Jim, when Gran died you were the only thing that kept me from spiralling into the ground. Without you there to keep me going I'm sure I would have ended up right back where I was when we met on the shuttle in Riverside. Broken, drunk, lost. But you were there, every step of the way to make sure my dumb ass didn’t fall back, and I didn’t even have to ask,” he ran his thumb across Jim's knuckles as he spoke, “and another thing I'm going to be changing when you wake up… as soon as you're well enough to be discharged and can sleep in your own room again, I'm moving my stuff out of my place and straight into yours. No more sleeping alone. I know you did it back then because of Gran, but then it just became… normal. We never should have taken separate rooms. I don’t know about you, but I hated it from the start and I still do. So, whether you like it or not, Jim, I'm moving in.”

Len sighed hard, pinching the bridge of his nose. His Gran was right all those years ago, Jim was special and meant more to Len then he could bring himself to admit back then. But if this mess had taught him anything, it was that life was too short to let things like fear get in your way of true happiness. So he vowed that when he did finally have Jim awake and back in his arms again, this time, he wasn’t letting go ever again. 

He leaned forwards, placing his head on Jim's chest, right over his heart to listen to the steady thrum. “You better come back to me soon, kid… you're all I’ve got left and you can’t leave me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did that hurt anyone else as much as it hurt me?? I actually cried.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this turned into a little treat for y’all! There is definitely a very nice scene in this chapter *wiggles eyebrows* (i guess you could call it… smut) Now, that’s not at all how I originally intended for this chapter to go, but I started writing it, and things happened, and I couldn’t stop them from happening, so I just went with the flow and I liked it! So, yeah, please enjoy!
> 
> ALSO!!!!!! I owe this entire chapter to my dear friend and Boo @goingknowherewastaken on tumblr. (if i knew how to tag her on here i would but i suck at technology lol) She helped me plan out this entire chapter because shes freaking awesome! So if y’all haven checked her out already, you should!! <3

As Len rested his head on Jim's chest, still listening to the constant thrum of his heart, the padd he had abandoned on the bedside table chimed at him. Slowly he lifted his head off of Jim and grabbed the padd. 

The next log on the screen was flashing, waiting for Len to play it. This time it was one of Jim's. 

He found himself slightly hesitant this time. He wanted to know what had happened, to hear the rest of Jim's logs, and Spock had insisted that there was a reason, something at the end that would make everything fall into place and finally make sense. But it still broke his heart straight to the core that the only way he could hear Jim's voice right now was through his logs. He wanted to hear Jim's real voice, speaking to him face to face, but Jim was still showing no signs of waking up. 

With a heavy sigh he forced himself to open the next log, sitting back with the padd in one hand and Jim's hand in the other as it started to play.

“Hey, Bones,” Len closed his eyes at the sound. By this point Jim had been on the planet for at least twenty days now, alone and walking across the empty desert. Len had lost track of the exact date in the logs since Jim had stopped adding stardates to his entries. But what really got Len at this point was the change in Jim's voice. Surely he was malnourished, dehydrated, and in pain from his injuries, but there was almost a distance in Jim's voice now. Almost as if he was starting to lose himself to the planet, to the empty desert, to the loneliness. Delirium was what Len would diagnose, at least the early onset of it. He shook his head trying to push the thought of Jim going crazy alone in the desert out of his mind as it played on, “I was thinking about you today, about how worried you must be by now, and probably scared and I'm sorry for that, Bones. But there was one time you really scared the hell out of me. You were missing and I was running my ass all over campus looking for you, but also… something happened that day and I… I don’t know if you remember, you were pretty drunk that night. But if I do die here, Bones, I want you to know what happened, and that I don’t necessarily regret it, but I wish it had happened under different circumstances. But, do you remember that time I had to peel your ass out of the bar… you probably don’t but I wish you did. You were so drunk you probably don’t even know what happened, you might not even remember getting from the bar back to our room. But, Bones, what happened when we got home… I wish I could have told you, but I was afraid. You were drunk and I wasn’t sure if your reaction was true or if it was because of the alcohol, and if it was I didn’t want to ruin us, I didn’t want to ruin our friendship. But I wish I could have told you how bad I wanted it to be true, Bones, when I had the chance, but I guess if you ever find this comm… now you'll know…”

~~~~~~~~~~~

To say that Jim was worried was the understatement of the year. He was horrified, scared as hell, and on the verge of panic attack number four of the day. He had woke up that morning to find Len gone from their room. His side of the bed was empty and cold, proving he had been gone for a while before Jim woke up, with no note or explanation as to why he had left. 

Normally, Jim wouldn’t have been so worried, but it was a rare day. They both had a Wednesday off, the entire day. No classes, no work, just the entire day for themselves, and they had planned out the whole day together. Sleep in, get a late brunch together at the diner in town they both loved, Len had wanted a walk on the beach in the afternoon, a movie after dinner, and Jim had asked if they could lay in the grass at the park that night and watch the stars together. 

It was a whole day of just being together, they had both been so excited for the day to come, and now Len was nowhere to be found. It was around eight in the morning when Jim woke up to find him gone, and it was now nearing ten at night. Jim had been from one side of campus to the other, he had asked everyone he could possibly think of that might know of Len’s whereabouts but no one seemed to have any information. He was about to call in a missing persons report when his phone vibrated in his pocket, and he quickly pulled it out to see if it was Len finally returning the fifty voicemails and countless texts he had sent him.

“Bones?!” he had answered the phone so fast he hadn’t even looked at the caller ID.

“Jim,” Jim deflated at the voice on the line, it wasn’t Len's, “hey, it’s Anthony.”

“Hey, man, look,” he sighed, starting up at a run again through campus, “I’d love to talk but now’s not really a good time, I-”

“That’s why I'm calling,” Jim slowed down just slightly to listen better, “heard you were looking for McCoy?”

“I am.”

“I’ve got him here,” Jim released a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding, “unfortunately I didn’t see him on time before he managed to pump himself full of almost two full bottles of bourbon, so he's practically hanging off my bar, but he's here and I’ll keep him here until you can come get him if you want.”

“Yeah!” Jim started up again at a full run, “Make sure he doesn’t move, I'm on my way!”

~~~~~~~~~~

About fifteen minutes later Jim burst through the doors to the bar. It was quiet tonight, exams were in this week so most students were at home studying, save for the few who were just here for a good time. Looking around he instantly spotted Len at the bar, hanging off of it and looking an absolute mess just as Anthony had said. 

A glance to the side had Jim looking at the large bar owner, standing in front of Len on the other side of the bar. Jim wasn’t all too happy that Len was very obviously drunk off his ass, but the pure flow of relief that coursed through him when he finally laid eyes on Len was the best feeling he had ever felt in his life. 

When Jim reached the bar, Anthony nodded at him before saying, “Sorry, Jim. I tried to get him to down some water but he won’t have it.”

Jim looked down to Len as he just groaned, then back up to Anthony, “I don’t know which one of my employees allowed him to consume this much alcohol, but believe me when I find them, and I will, they’ll be lucky if I don’t hang their ass by the flagpole in the middle of campus. I'm sorry, man.”

“It’s not your fault,” Jim gave the man a small smile, “I'm just glad he's somewhat alright, or in my sights at least. Thanks for keeping him here.”

“No problem,” Anthony held a hand across the bar for Jim to shake, then gave a nod and said, “I’ll give you two some space,” and walked away.

When Anthony was at the other end of the bar, Jim took up the stool next to Len and sat down with a hand on his back. “Bones, what's going on?”

Len just groaned, his head still buried in his arms on the bar.

“Can’t help you if you don’t talk to me, and you know I'm not gunna stop nagging you until you do,” he gave a slight smirk when Len squirmed beside him, “so you can take your pick, easy way or the hard way.”

Slowly, Len forced himself to sit up straight, well, as straight as he could for as drunk as he was. He turned a scrunched face on Jim, more then likely fighting a raging headache. 

Jim grabbed the glass of water that Anthony had tried to give him earlier and forced it into Len's hand, “Drink the whole thing, Bones.”

He did, all in one go, and when he was finished Jim motioned to Anthony for another, forcing that one into his hand as well. “Alright, now tell me what's going on.”

Len took a moment and ran a hand down his face, then reached a hand inside his jacket and handed Jim a folded up envelope. Jim took it, watching Len with worried eyes as he did, and pulled the papers out taking a minute to read them before responding with a deflated sigh, “I'm sorry, Bones.”

“I don’t know what her problem is,” he choked out, “it’s not like I was a bad father.”

“I'm sure you weren’t.”

“I worked extra hours so that we had extra money, so we could give Joanna everything she needed and would ever need,” he shook his head, staring straight ahead as he continued his venting, “and yeah, I know… I know I wasn’t home all the time, but I tried, Jim. I really did. I even tried to make it work with Jocelyn. We both knew long before Joanna came along that we should never have been together, but I tried to make it work for the baby, and she threw everything away, not me. She ruined my life.”

Jim winced at those words, looking away for a moment then turning back. “You can’t think about it that way, Bones. I know things went south for a while after she kicked you out but you got your life back on track. You’ve got a great career ahead of you with Starfleet, you're the head of the medbay at the academy, a few years away from graduating and then you and me will be in space, together, exploring and discovering new things! You have a great life ahead of you, Bones, you can’t look back at the past and let it run your life anymore.”

“Jim, I'm a mess,” he stated firmly, “an absolute, goddamn mess, who obviously can’t keep a handle on it for very long. Says so right in the papers you're holding.”

Jim lifted the papers in front of him and waved them furiously before throwing them on the counter, “These papers are a load of crap, Bones, send them back!”

“I can’t,” he pushed the papers away from him as if they were some kind of plague, “Jocelyn wants to finalize the custody arrangement, that meaning I never get to see Joanna again.”

“Fight it!” Jim leaned in towards Len, “She can’t keep you from your own flesh and blood.”

“I’ve tried,” he replied, sounding more defeated then Jim had ever heard him sound, even at his lowest, “and apparently she can. Because of my track record when she kicked me out, before I got into the academy and straightened out, she's been granted full custody of Joanna. And with the best lawyers this side of the planet, I have no choice.”

Jim sighed with a shake of his head, “I'm sorry, I'm really sorry.”

“Yeah well, guess I had it coming,” he shrugged, “I was obviously a terrible husband, a crappy father, and shit at everything else. I'm only good for screwing things up.”

“Bull!” Jim slammed a fist on the counter making Len turn to look him dead in the eyes, “I would bet my life that you would be the best husband in the world, a fantastic father… an excellent lover. It’s not your fault that this time it was with the wrong person.” Jim hesitantly lifted a hand to Len's face, stroking his thumb across his cheek, and he was sure he heard Len's breath hitch as he did, “Jocelyn doesn’t know what she let go.”

The two of them just stared at each other for a moment, Jim continuing to caress his cheek, and Len not knowing what to do or say. Before the moment could get much more heated, Len turned his attention to the papers on the counter, holding them in his hand.

“I sign these papers, Jim…” he closed his eyes, “I’ve got nothing left.”

Jim nodded, turning away from Len to stare down at the counter and whispered, “You’ve got me.”

Len whipped his head around to Jim, the sodden expression on his face pulling at every heart string he had, “Jim, I didn’t meant it like that, I just-”

Jim lifted his head and turned to Len with a smile, “I know. I just wanted to make sure you knew you weren’t alone, and you never will be again, not as long as I'm around. I promise.”

Those words hit Len like a brick wall. Even when Jocelyn had said her vows, ‘till death do us part’, he knew it was a lie. He knew she wouldn’t be around long, he knew they were never meant to be together and yet he still went through with it. But with Jim… it was different, it had always been different. Right from the start he knew Jim was here to stay, and so was he. He knew that nothing in the world, or the universe could ever tear them apart, but hearing Jim say it out loud, to promise him that when he already knew it was true, meant more to Len then he would ever be able to express in words. 

Losing all control over his body, Len leaned into Jim slowly, making sure he had enough time to back out if he wanted to. But he didn’t, in fact Len was sure Jim was leaning in too. If they both wanted this, then why had they waited so goddamn long? It could have been the alcohol talking, but despite his current drunken state, Len still knew he wanted this, he wanted Jim… always had. 

He was inches away from his face, he could feel Jim's breath on his lips, their noses touching ever so slightly. He was almost there, almost touching, almost kissing Jim. 

He rested a hand on Jim's thigh and was ready to close the gap and make the leap, when his stomach suddenly rolled and betrayed him and before he could kiss Jim, he found himself bending over and completely emptying the contents of his stomach onto Jim's shoes. 

Jim groaned throwing his head back in frustration. Not at the fact that Len had just ruined his shoes, but at the fact that it seemed every time they were that close, something happened to completely ruin the moment. Damn it, he was almost there. But maybe it was for the better, Len was obviously not at his best right now and Jim had to concentrate on taking care of him first.

He lifted Len from where he had his head rested on Jim's knee and hooked his arm around his shoulder. As he lifted Len off the seat and began walking with him out of the bar he threw an apologetic look at Anthony, “Sorry, man.”

He merely waved him off saying, “Don’t worry about it, we’ve had much worse. You just make sure you take care of the good doctor.”

Jim gave him a nod in thanks and began the slow trek back across campus to their building. 

Half way there Len groaned and laid his head on Jim's shoulder as they continued to stagger across the grounds, “Can’t we just take a cab back?”

Jim chuckled, “Nope. Consider this punishment for ruining my best pair of shoes and making me worry about you all day. And the fresh air will do you good, wake your drunk ass up a little.”

He groaned into Jim's shoulder again as they kept walking.

It took Jim about twice the time it would normally take to get Len home and finally plop him on the couch with a tired sigh of relief. He left him there for a moment to grab him another glass of water and some pain meds for his headache, placing both in his hands before sitting himself on the couch beside him. A quick glance at the clock told Jim it was well past two in the morning already, and he rubbed his tired eyes.

“Jim…” 

“Yeah, Bones?” he turned towards his friend who seemed a bit better already. He was sitting up straight and his eyes seemed to finally have some life to them again. 

“I… thanks,” he blushed a little in embarrassment, “you didn’t have to do that for me.”

“Of course I did,” he gave Len a stern look, “I told you, I will always be here for you, Bones, no matter what that means. Even if that’s dragging your ass home from the bar at two in the morning, I'm here.”

“You shouldn’t have to be, I'm a grown ass man, I should know better.”

“It’s not exactly your fault. If I got the same letter you got I'm sure I would have also ran to the bar to drink it dry, so I don’t blame you for losing yourself for a while,” he said softly, then turned on Len with a bit of anger in his voice, “but that being said, do not ever do that to me again, Leonard McCoy!” Len flinched at the use of his full name coming out of Jim's mouth, he had never called him anything other then Bones, “I wake up and you're gone?! No note, no message of any kind, not answering calls or texts, no one on campus knows where you are. I thought the worst, Bones! I nearly had a heart attack, and I did, just so you know, have several full blown panic attacks because I couldn’t find you. I was so worried that you were hurt or missing, who knows what could have happened. You scared the absolute hell out of me, Bones, don’t do it again!”

Len had the decency to turn away sheepishly, “Sorry, Jim.”

“You should be,” then he sighed and gave Len a tired smile, “but its okay. You're safe and home with me now, so just next time wake me up or leave a note. Just let me know you're okay.”

‘Safe and home with me’. Len let those words roll around in his mind for a while. He was safe with Jim, and home… home had always been with Jim, where ever he was that’s where Len wanted to be. Jim was his home. It took him far too damn long to figure that out, but there was nothing in his life he knew to be truer then that. 

“You know, you were right, Jim,” Jim hummed in response, too tired to do much else, “I wasn’t with the right person, and that’s why it all fell apart. But maybe… maybe the right person was always closer then I thought, right in front of me all along.”

Jim turned tired, almost closed eyes on Len in question, “What do you mean?”

Len watched him for a minute, his eyes going between Jim's own and his lips, and in a rushed decision he whispered, “To hell with Jocelyn,” and before Jim could give any sign of protest he did what he had wanted to do for a long time and closed the gap. He finally kissed Jim. 

It was nothing more then a firm press of lips on lips. It lasted mere seconds before Len was pulling back, searching Jim's wide eyes for something, anything, some kind of indication as to whether or not he had crossed an unwanted line. But there was nothing, Jim just remained seated beside him on the couch in… shock?

Len reached out a hand to touch Jim's cheek, to apologize for what he had just done and maybe he could blame it on the alcohol, but before he could say anything Jim leapt forwards and took Len's mouth. 

This time the kiss wasn’t so one sided, it was more then Len had ever hoped for in his first time kissing Jim. It was intense, breathtaking, and almost hungry in the way Jim pushed against him begging for more contact. Len pushed back, giving Jim what he wanted and kept pushing until Jim was on his back on the couch with Len on top. Jim sucked Len's bottom lip into his mouth and nipped at it as he opened his legs to let Len settle between them. 

There was no tongue, but the two continued to move their lips together in perfect sync. Jim's hands held Len's face close to his, and Len's hands snuck down Jim's body to the edge of his shirt, lifting it up to touch and caress the warm skin there. At the feel of Len's hands on him, Jim bucked up into Len, grinding them together sending pleasure screaming through their bodies. Jim gasped into Len's mouth at the feeling and Len moaned in response, laying his head against Jim's. “Oh, Jim,” he moaned again when Jim bucked once more.

They continued their heated rhythm, sucking on each others lips and Jim bucking and grinding up against Len. After one last kiss, breaking off with a smack, Len trailed his lips down to Jim's neck and began sucking there. Jim's eyes rolled back in his head as he wrapped his arms around Len's neck, weaving his fingers in Len's hair in a tight grip. Between Len sucking on the base of his neck and the friction of their now hard cocks rubbing together through their clothes, Jim was sure he wasn’t going to last much longer. One particularly hard thrust from Len had Jim nearly screaming his name as he tightened his hold on him moaning out a long, “Bones!” before Len's body fell completely against his and stopped moving. 

Jim was breathless, his chest heaving and his body shaking, but Len had suddenly stopped everything. His hands were still where they remained pushed up his shirt against his chest, his lips were rested against his neck but no longer sucking on that sweet spot, and his body seemed heavier on his then it did a second ago. 

Jim tried to push against Len but he was solid on top of him, and he managed to choke out a breathy, “Bones?” before he heard a soft snore come from the man on top of him. 

He had fallen asleep. In the heated throws of their moment, when Jim finally thought he was getting everything that he had wanted and that Len was just as eager for it as he was, he fell asleep. 

Jim plopped his head back against the arm rest of the couch with a thud, “You're kidding me…” he sighed. 

Maybe this wasn’t the right moment after all. He had been right back in the bar. Len clearly wasn’t himself right now, and he almost felt guilty about taking advantage of his drunken state. This could have ended way worse then it did. 

He took a few minutes to calm himself down and catch his breath, before mustering his strength and pushing Len up with him. The man was out cold and didn’t even flinch when Jim stood and carried him bridal across the living room and placed him gently in bed. 

He ran a quick shower and hopped in so he could take care of his… current problem, and when he was finished and cleaned off, he changed and hopped into bed beside Len as he did every night. He pulled the blankets up over them both and settled in. He wasn’t surprised when Len turned over in his sleep and wrapped an arm and a leg over Jim and pulled him into his chest. He was tucked right against Len with his head against his chest, his favourite spot to be in the whole world, and how they fell asleep most nights now. But tonight was a little different, it was a little more hopeful after what had happened on the couch. 

Len was definitely drunk, but maybe Jim could talk to him about it tomorrow, maybe he would remember something, maybe it wasn’t all an alcohol induced decision. Whatever the case, Jim decided he would cross that bridge tomorrow. Make the choice then whether or not he would talk to Len about what happened. 

With that thought pushed aside, he took one last look up at Len's sleeping face and leaned up to place a soft kiss against his lips. To Jim's surprise Len's body responded and pulled him even closer and kissed back just the slightest. When he pulled back and Len's eyes remained closed he smiled and whispered a sweet, “Good night, Bones,” and laid his head back on Len's chest and fell asleep. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

The sun broke through a crack in the curtains on the window by Len's bed and hit him smack in the face. He covered his eyes with a groan, rolling over in the bed to try and hide his face from the light since he already had the world’s worst headache pounding against his skull. But when he rolled over expecting to roll into Jim's familiar warmth, he found nothing but empty space. Confused, he opened his eyes and confirmed that Jim was gone, and a quick look through the open bedroom door confirmed that he wasn’t in the suite at all. 

Len rolled onto his back with an arm over his aching eyes and thought back on the night before. He had kissed Jim, and then Jim had kissed him back. It was hands down the most passionate and breathtaking moment of Len's life and he would give anything to be back in that moment. 

He continued through the memory, of pushing Jim back, laying against his chest, roaming his hands over his skin, the kissing, the sucking, the grinding, the pleasure. Did… did Jim actually want this as much as he did, or was that some kind of heat of the moment thing? A part of him wanted to know, wanted to know if Jim really felt that way, the way he seemed to feel last night when he was grinding up into him and moaning in his ear. But did he really want to risk losing Jim only to find out that he was wrong? Maybe he should just wait and see if Jim brought it up. Maybe that was the safest option and he decided that’s how he would play it for now. 

The thought only made his headache worse, and so he rolled out of bed to grab more pain meds from the kitchen, but he didn’t have to go far. When he swung his legs over the bed to get himself up, he noticed that Jim had left him a glass of water and meds on the nightstand, but there was also a folded piece of paper leaning against the glass with “Bones” scribbled in Jim's messy writing on the front. 

He grabbed the meds and took them both in one go, then grabbed the paper and opened it.

“Bones, 

I had to go to an early exam, but I’ll be back around eleven. I just wanted to make sure that this information got to you before you woke up and signed those ridiculous papers. After you passed out last night and I managed to get you in bed, I couldn’t sleep much so I made some calls. This is the number of an old friend of mine, we used to be neighbours in Iowa. His name is Rami Ramesky, and he's a big time family lawyer based out of L.A. I told him your situation last night and he said he would be more then willing to help you out. 

He had mentioned that since we would be going into space in a few short years, it wouldn’t make much sense to completely refute the custody arrangement, since its not like you can have weekends and certain holidays with Joanna while we are light years away, but he did come up with a plan. He wants to suggest that an open line of communication is always available between you and Joanna, anytime, and upon docking for shore leave you would have full access to unsupervised visits with Joanna including any holidays we are docked for, since Jocelyn would have Joanna for the entire time we are in space.

I know I may have overstepped a bit but… please call him, Bones. I don’t want to see you kept away from your daughter because of your ex-wife’s unreasonable demands, and I know Rami can help you win this. He's a great lawyer, Bones, I looked him up. He's won ninety percent of all of his cases, and I wouldn’t be recommending him to you if I thought he would only disappoint you.

Please call him, Bones.

Love, Jim”

Bones couldn’t help but smile as he read over the note once more. The fact that Jim had gone out of his way to make sure Len had a second chance at his daughter was beyond anything anyone had ever done for Len in his life, and only solidified his love for Jim that much more. And of course Jim hadn’t overstepped, he never could in Len's eyes, and he was glad he had Jim by his side no matter what. 

With a new found determination and a slight swelling in his heart, Len crossed the room and went directly for the computer and called the number at the bottom of the page. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

“After that night I was too afraid to bring it up.” Jim's voice came choked through the padd, and Len could feel tears welling in his eyes, stinging, “Now that I'm here, I wish I had though. I was never really sure if what happened that night between us was because you were drunk, or if it was something you actually wanted. But you should know, I wanted it, Bones, so bad.”

Len closed his eyes trying to will the tears away as Jim went on, “And I figured that since you never brought it up after that night, you didn’t remember. So I thought it was because you were drunk after all, and that you never really felt that way about me, so I let it go. Figured if I could still have you as a friend it was better then losing you to a misunderstanding. But you should know, that was the best moment of my life. And looking back now I think maybe we did both hold some feelings for each other, and I wish that we hadn’t wasted all this time dancing around our fears. So, Bones, if I don’t make it back just know, from day one it was always you…”

By the time the log ended Len was fighting with all his might to hold back the sobs he could feel stuck in his throat. He took a moment before he spoke, not quite trusting his voice, then with a shaky breath he looked to Jim, “Oh kid, I definitely remember that night with you, and hell if we aren’t both the biggest idiots in the whole damn universe,” he closed his eyes and shook his head, “of course I felt the same way about you, but like you, I was never sure if you felt that way about me. And you're right, looking back now, we were fools not to say anything and I regret not telling you that I remembered every second of that night.”

He ran his thumb across Jim's fingers before continuing, “I wish I would have told you, but I was so afraid I would lose you, just like you were afraid to lose me, Jim-” he had to turn away for a moment to compose himself before turning back, “damn it, Jim, all the time we’ve wasted, we could have been together like we should have been, then maybe this wouldn’t have happened.”

The wait was killing Len. Going through these logs and hearing Jim's confessions while he was still lying in bed in a coma, where Len could talk but Jim couldn’t hear him. He wanted Jim to wake up so he could tell him everything he should have said years and years ago. Len squeezed his hand and took a shuttering breath, “Everything good in my life has happened because of you, Jim. I stayed in Starfleet because of you, graduated because of you, I am where I am today because of you, and Joanna,” he lifted a hand up to wipe the tear sliding down his cheek, “because of you I was able to keep in contact with my daughter. That lawyer you recommended did exactly what you said he would and I was able to have open communication with her up here, and you sat beside me during every single hearing until we won the case. Without you, Jim, I would have just signed those papers, so you see how bad I need you, kid?”

Len leaned back in his chair, pulling Jim's hand into his lap, “Maybe when we get back, and I take you to Georgia, we’ll pick up Joanna. And the three of us can spend some time together, you can finally meet her. I’ve told her all about you, she always asks about you, but I think its time you two met.” Len nodded to himself, “When we get to Georgia, Jim, when we get home, I… I want us to be a family. You, me, Joanna, the three of us. Now I just need you to wake up so I can tell you all this, so we can actually do that, so please Jim… just wake up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooo, yeah, thats that!
> 
> Hope everyone enjoyed the chapter and please feel free to leave a comment, your words are my motivation <3<3<3


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all!! Back again with another chapter, and I regret to say that we are getting close to the end of this journey. Close, but we still have a little bit of a ways to go. Thanks to everyone for sticking with this story! <3

A knock came at the door before Len heard it click open and rushed to wipe his eyes before turning around.

“How is it going, Doctor?” Spock eyed Len as he walked into the room, “Have you finished the logs?”

“Not yet, I just…” Len sucked in a breath, heaving it out, “I'm having a hard time getting through them. All these memories that Jim's bringing up, things I should have done or said back then… I wish I had time…”

Len leaned into his hands and whimpered, trying not to cry in front of Spock.

“Doctor, there will be time. Jim will pull through, he is a strong man.”

“He should have woken up by now, it’s been five days!” Len turned angry red eyes back on Spock.

“Yes,” Spock nodded, then gave Len a good once over, “and you have been holed up in here for all of them, sleeping in this chair and barely eating, which is why I am here. You must take a break, Doctor. Go to your quarters, shower, and change. I have Lieutenant Uhora bringing food to your room as we speak, it will be there for you when you arrive.”

Len quickly shook his head, “I can’t leave, Spock, not while he's still like this.”

“I will remain by his side while you are gone and if anything changes I will call you immediately.”

“I'm not leaving,” Len was determined to hold his ground on the matter, pulling Jim's hand closer to his chest as he did.

“Doctor, please,” Spock almost begged, “I am not trying to pull you away from Jim. The crew and I only ask that you take a small break and allow some time for yourself to regroup and at least change your clothes. And perhaps you could… make a few calls,” Len turned slightly to look at the Vulcan, hands clasped behind his back and eyebrow raised in typical Spock fashion, “there has been a certain someone calling all week inquiring on the conditions of the Captain. I have been intercepting the calls while you have remained by Jim's side but I do not think I can deter them any longer. I promised that I would have you return their calls today, and I do not intend to break that promise.”

Len sighed, he knew exactly who it was and he never should have neglected them or pushed aside their calls for so long. He should have called right away but his only thoughts at the time were on Jim, still were. 

With a sigh he forced himself from the chair, every bone in his body protesting at the sudden change in position. He stretched and popped his bones for relief, then turned away from Spock and leaned into Jim, the Vulcan turning his back to allow them some privacy in the moment.

Len rubbed his nose against Jim's and whispered against his lips, “I’ll be back, so don’t you go anywhere while I'm gone, you hear?” then he placed a soft kiss on his chapped lips and turned to face Spock. 

When the Vulcan heard the doctor’s footsteps approaching him he turned back, and was now face to face with Len who shot him a no-nonsense look as he recited his terms, “I will go to my room, eat, shower, make the one phone call, and then I'm right back here. And if anything, and I mean anything happens while I am gone, you call me right away! You got it?”

Spock nodded once, “I understand completely, Doctor, and you have my word.”

“Great,” he walked past Spock to the door, “I will be no longer then an hour, less if I can help it.” 

He gave one last look back at Jim in the bed, Spock now occupying his chair by his side, and then turned to leave before he could change his mind. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

Len practically ran through the halls of the Enterprise and into his room. The doors barely had a moment to close behind him before he was already shucking his clothes off and tossing them haphazardly across the room, making his way to the shower as fast as he could. The faster he could get this done and satisfy Spock, then the faster he could get back to Jim's side.

He stopped at the bathroom door when he looked into the living room. There was a tray of food there as Spock had said there would be, so he walked over to examine it. There was a sandwich, a bowl of fruit, and a salad. As much as he knew himself that he was hungry and that the small fruit cups Chapel kept forcing him to eat were not enough, he just couldn’t muster up the strength to force himself to eat any of the food on the tray. So instead, he peeled off the remainder of his clothes and jumped in the shower.

It was the quickest shower of his life. He was in, washed, and out in under five minutes, changed, and running through the living room while he towel dried his hair vigorously. Now that he was clean and honestly feeling a little better, he walked back over to the tray of food. He decided on half the sandwich and the bowl of fruit and walked over to the computer desk to eat it. When he was finished, he opened a call window and called the person Spock had mentioned back in Jim's room, feeling slightly guilty about ignoring them for so long.

The call was answered almost immediately, and a familiar and welcomed face popped up on the screen. “What. The. Ever-loving. Hell?!”

“Hey,” Len leaned towards the screen, “you may be a teenager now, but that doesn’t mean you can use language like that with your old man.”

The dark haired girl took a calming breath then went on, “Sorry, Daddy, but can you blame me?! You have non stop talked about this Jim Kirk since Mom let me start talking to you again after the custody battle was over. I have heard nothing else besides the name Jim Kirk since then, and that was years ago! And then over a month ago you suddenly call me in a panic saying that Jim is missing. I called every day after that to find out if you had found him and how the search was going, and then one day I call and speak to a Vulcan who tells me that Jim had been found and that you were in the room with him. No one would tell me if he was okay or even alive, and I’ve called everyday for the last five days and got the same spiel. That you were still with Jim, you weren’t taking any calls at the moment, and that they would leave it up to you to inform me any further. But a damn lot of good that does when you won’t even call me back! I may not know Jim, or have even met him, but I do know you care about him a lot, Daddy, and I have been in a panic for days! I thought the worst.”

“I'm sorry, Joanna, its just…” he sighed and ran a hand through his hair, “it’s been a hard couple of days.”

“So tell me what's going on,” she gave him a serious look, “is he ok?”

“He’s stable, but he… he won’t wake up. He's been in a coma for five days and I-” Len choked on a sob and turned his face away from the screen, not wanting to cry in front of his daughter. 

“Daddy,” he kept his gaze turned away, “Daddy, look at me for a second.”

Reluctantly he turned back, eyes stinging and red, “Daddy… do you love Jim?”

His eyes went wide and a slight panic tightened his chest at the sudden question, “Why would you ask me that?”

“I already know the answer,” she smiled at her father softly, “I can tell in the way you talk about him, the way your eyes look when you call me and tell me about him. The way your voice sounds when you say his name. The way he's all you can think about all the time, the only thing you want to talk about, and for the month that he was missing he was the only thing you cared about. And, Daddy, I’ll be honest, I was worried about what would happen to you if you lost Jim. It’s like he's a part of you and without him you were not the same person. You need Jim, and if that’s not love I don’t know what is.”

Len just stared at the screen still in shock as his daughter kept speaking, “And its ok, Daddy, that you do love him. I’ve never seen you as happy as you are with Jim, and I want you to always be that happy. So, I already know that you love Jim Kirk, but I think maybe you need to hear yourself say it. So tell me, Daddy, do you love Jim Kirk?”

The wisdom of his teenage daughter was astounding. She had grown into such an amazing person already and Len was so proud of her, but maybe she was right. He had told himself that he loved Jim, whispered to Jim of the love he would show him when he woke up, how he would never let him go again, but he had never actually said the words out loud. 

“Say it,” she whispered, as if afraid to scare him away, “out loud.”

“I… I do,” he started, barely above a whisper, but Joanna still heard it, “I love Jim Kirk, and if he doesn’t wake up-”

He turned his head again as the tears welled up even faster this time, when Joanna called to him softly again. 

“Daddy,” he turned back, on the cusp of holding it together, “you know it’s ok to cry right, it’s always ok to cry.”

And that’s what did it. He broke down completely, losing all control over himself, bawling his eyes out in front of his daughter, sobbing and choking on his breaths. Tears were streaming down his face, dripping off his cheeks and landing on the table below him, and Joanna sat there with him while he cried it out. 

When he was finished, when his sobs and wails died down into hiccups and he wiped his face clean with his sleeve, that’s when she spoke again, “How do you feel?”

“Better,” he hiccupped again, “I won’t be perfect until he's awake, but I do feel better.”

“Good,” she smiled, happy she could help relieve even a little of her fathers stress, “now tell me everything that happened since he was found, it will help to get everything off your chest.”

“He came in five days ago,” he began, a little more steady now then when he first called, “he was… broken, bruised, bleeding. Some was old, some was new. He had been stranded on some desert planet for almost forty-five days. When Spock found him he was unconscious and had wandered away from the crash sight in search of food and water, but seeing as how he was extremely dehydrated and malnourished when they found him he obviously didn’t find either.”

She nodded and remained silent, and he continued.

“They brought him on board and rushed him to the medbay. I tended to his injuries and when he was finished with surgery I sat myself beside his bed and I’ve been with him since. But Spock, he…” he takes a breath, “he found Jim's comm beside him on the planet and wanted me to listen to all the logs he made while he was stranded, and… its been hard and I'm not even finished them yet.”

“What did they say?”

“They started off as normal captain’s logs,” he shook his head, thinking back on all the logs he'd heard so far, “just updates on the crash, where they were, conditions of the cadets he was with.”

“The fourteen new recruits from the academy that Jim took on board,” she nodded, remembering her father telling her that detail earlier.

“Yes,” he nodded, “some died on impact, but by two weeks Jim had lost them all and he was alone.”

She gasped, covering her face in horror, “They all died?!”

“Every single one,” Len sighed, closing his eyes, “he's gunna blame himself for this.”

“He shouldn’t, it’s not his fault you were attacked in open space.”

Len pursed his lips, “He won’t see it that way.”

“Then it’s your job to make sure he knows better when he wakes up.” He looked at her, the look in her eyes, and he knew she was right, “What else did they say?”

“After that they… changed,” he scrunched his brow as he explained, “they started becoming less and less formal and more geared towards me. Like he was talking only to me, as if he was leaving me some kind of… of goodbye letter. He started talking about old memories, things he was sorry about, things he never got to tell me but wished he had, and… it’s hard to listen to them when he's laying there, eyes closed, when he could still-”

“Don’t,” she stopped him, “don’t do that to yourself. He's going to be fine.”

“He should be awake by now, Joanna, it’s been five days.” 

“I don’t know Jim, but from what you’ve told me about him, he seems a little… dramatic,” Len couldn’t help but chuckle, “I'm sure he's just waiting for the right moment to make his grand entrance.”

“Yeah,” he said with a small smile gracing his lips for the first time in weeks, “you're probably right.”

“But there’s more to this, I can tell. So, out with it.”

“Listening to him talking about these memories with me, things we did together, things he wished he had said back then,” he sighed hard, “now it’s all I can think about. There were so many times I could have told Jim how I felt but didn’t, so many times. And I should have. And now that I'm looking back on all of this through Jim's logs, its obvious that we have both felt the same way for a long time, and to think all the time we’ve wasted secretly pining for each other when we could have just been together, but we were both too damn scared to act on it.”

“So this is where you change that. When Jim wakes up you make sure that you push down every fear you’ve ever had about telling Jim what you’ve just told me, and you tell him everything. How you’ve felt for all the years you’ve known him, how much you missed him, how much it hurt to be without him, and how much you love him. Ok, Daddy,” she held a finger out to the screen, almost scolding Len from across the galaxy, “you tell him everything, or so help me if you don’t I’ll come out there and do it myself!”

Len laughed, actually laughed for the first time in over a month, “Jim would like you. He actually said in one of his logs that he wanted to meet you, that he would have been happy to have you as his family, so if he wakes up you should meet him.”

“When he wakes up,” she made sure to emphasise the word, “I would love to meet him! I’ve been dying to since you started telling me about him. I'm excited to meet the man that makes my daddy so happy.”

“He really does, darlin’,” he smiled softly, thinking about Jim. 

“So,” she began with a little smirk, “when I talk to him, what should I call him? Jim, dad… papa?”

Len laughed again shaking his head at his daughter, “Yeah, I’ll let you two figure that out.”

“How does Jim feel about kids anyways?” she quirked a brow, “do I see a sibling in my future?! The pitter patter of little feet. I would love a little brother!”

He rolled his eyes with a smirk, “I know Jim loves kids, and always talks about having some of his own, but when he meets you he might change his mind.” 

“What are you talking about,” She chuckled, waving her arms in the air, “he's gunna love me!”

“Yeah, he certainly is.”

They smiled at each other for a brief moment before she smiled and said, “You should head back to him, I'm sure he's waiting for you.” 

Before he could answer his comm went off in his pocket flashing Spock's name. Panic and fear filled his eyes as he looked to Joanna who had the same look when she cried, “Go, Daddy!” He didn’t even bother to answer the comm and ran out of the room as fast as he could, needing to make sure Jim was okay. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

When Len barrelled into Jim's room, Spock was standing back by the door while Chapel checked over Jim and the machines attached to him. 

“What happened?!” he asked completely breathless.

“He stirred a few moments ago, but when I called out his name he ceased all movement. I thought perhaps he would wake, but it would seem he is not yet ready.”

Len looked from Spock to Jim in the bed and Joanna’s words came flooding back to him ‘he's waiting for you.’ He forced himself to take a calming breath to return his frantic heart rate back to normal, then moved past Spock and sat back in the chair taking Jim's hand in his again. Chapel stepped back and looked Len and Jim over once, then nodded to Spock and head out the door past him. 

Spock turned his gaze to Len and spoke evenly, “I shall leave you to it, Doctor.” Then his eyes moved from Len's to the padd on the desk prompting the next log, and he silently slipped from the room.

Len's eyes followed where Spock's had looked to the padd and he heaved a sigh. He reached over and grabbed it and to pull up the next log.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I hope everyone liked the addition of Joanna!

**Author's Note:**

> So that's chapter one! Let me know what you guys think <3


End file.
